This picture (taken a few years ago) is the result of my first serious attempt at spot metering (just had bought a camera offering that feature :-) The flower was standing under a tree in my parent's garden. The shadowy surroundings made it easy to get the background black (I removed a little patch of dark green to the left of the flower using Photoshop).

Nikon F-601, AF 35-70mm f/3.3-4.5, polarizer, spot metered on upper middle petal, exposure not recorded; AgfaChrome 100RS; scanned with HP Photosmart, adjusted and cropped using PhotoShop.

-- Philipp Leibfried (phil@provi.de), July 15, 1998

Answers

VERY nice.

I ususally prefer a more asymetrical placement (maybe a tad lower and to the right)but this works.

On cropping, I'd personally like to see the forum stick to standard cropping proportions (5x7, 4x5, 6x7, full frame (35mm/6x4.5) , or square (but only if the image was shot on medium format). But that's not a critisim of this image. ;>

I suppose the consensus is Photoshop techniques (removing a small patch of green) are OK if the same thing can be accomplished in a darkroom?

Exposure wise, the highlight on the lower petal is almost gone... A very slight diffussion screen over the top (a "light tent" or something similar) would have helped that.

Great choice of lighting. A little more side or back light would have hightened the translucent qualities of the petals, and a slightly shallower depth of field could have given it a little more "ethereal" quality...

I absolutley love it. It reminds me of a Georgia Okeefe painting (sort of).

Best wishes, Keith

PS If you have a web site post the URL so we can all check it out. :>

-- Keith Clark (ClarkPhotography@spiritone.com), July 15, 1998.

Great shot. My only quibble is the extreme highlight on the bottom petal, which I find distracting.

I'd like to know how you managed to get the background so dark. Did you use a flash or some other unnatural lighting? At what time of day was the picture taken? Was the flower in a little tiny patch of sunlight?

As for the cropping, I think posting "alternate" croppings is just fine. My biggest photography challenge (other than getting the *!@! focus right) is to see the "picture within the picture" -- cropping away little bits and pieces to perfect the image. What is gained by restricting submissions to conformist croppings?

-- Steve Leroux (steve@bigadventures.com), July 16, 1998.

Hi!

On the highlight: the almost-white highlight is due to the limitations of my scanner (I'll have to check the slide again, but I'm almost sure it's not "gone" there) and of my abilities with Photoshop. I was terribly difficult to adjust levels/contrast so that the pic would look (almost) like the slide.

On cropping: Originally, the flower is in the lower right corner of a 35mm slide. I thought that cutting away some black wouldn't harm. Also, with this file size limitation, you better keep them as small as possible :-)

On exposure: the flower was standing in a basically dark area under a tree, with just one ray of sunlight falling on it. To heighten the contrast and get the background black, I used a fully closed polarizer. I was somewhat surprised by the results myself. I've since read a rule of thumb somewhere that when there's three exposure values of difference between bright and dark areas, and you underexpose the bright areas slightly, the background will be black. I don't remember whether I used exposure compensation, but I don't think so. As I said, there was a dark patch of green left, so the original slide is not quite as "perfect" with respect to the black background as this picture.

A website is in the making... thanks for the encouragement.

Regards

-Philipp

-- Philipp Leibfried (phil@provi.de), July 16, 1998.

This is art - simple, gentle and virtually speaking - like a Japanese watercolor.

-- Jana Mullerova (jam@terma.com), July 16, 1998.

Wonderful. Remindes me of a butterfly. Simple composition centered but the wealth of diagonals and the colours make this dynamic. A slight fussiness but this softens it and gives it a gentleness.

Wonderful.

-- Paul Lenson (lenson@pci.on.ca), July 16, 1998.

I liked the way the camera angle makes this symetrical flower look a bit asymetrical. Kind of like a candid shot. It gives the flower a very "real" feeling (I guess I'm thinking of the opposite of a Mapplethorpe lily, all dressed up and prepped for the picture). Simple and un-assuming beauty.

-- Guy Tal (guy@spyra.com), July 16, 1998.

[cough] well, I just had a look at the slide. The highlight on the lower middle petal is quite white indeed. So, no excuses...

-- Philipp Leibfried (phil@provi.de), July 16, 1998.

simply terrific. the best composition and color production i have seen to date on this forum. the washed out highlight is not sufficiently distractive to impact the high overall excellence of the image.

-- wayne harrison (wayno@netmcr.com), July 17, 1998.

I love the way this flower seems to float in space - unconnected to anything. It's truly beautiful.

-- (andreas@physio.unr.edu), July 20, 1998.