Just an experiment from the nature walk. Curious about what you think of (a) sc to bring out the curve of the leaf and (b) placement of the dragonfly or whether it not just blends in so as to not be interesting and (c) square crop choice...
No need to comment...more nature to come.
I like the square format, which i use quite a lot, the curved leaf is well placed and catches the light but the dragonfly is a little lost as it is dark against a dark background. I look forward to more nature.
I think the leaf not the dragonfly is the star in this show! But I do like the way the leaf curlers around and leads you to the out of focus reed which then shoots the eyes right up to the dragon fly.
The first thing I noticed was the interesting curved leaf - liked the tones - my eye did follow to the dragonfly but felt your composition was more about "nature" than any one specific part - which I liked.
The square crop is just right for this image - it tells us that everything we see carries equal weight... the dragonfly and the leaf balance each other. I like too that this is essentially a two-tone image.
I like the sc for bringing out the curve of the leaf. But I think I would like to see the sc on the dragonfly too, as it gets a bit lost in the background.
@jgpittenger@888rachel You've both hit on what I saw as the problem. The dragonfly essentially is dark brownish-black, so no matter what I did, it felt like he faded into the background. I had wondered if using sc to turn the curved leaf into a sort of arrow might work, but I think it's one of those photos that just isn't going to be the way I'd want. Maybe by giving the leaf more space it makes it less about the insect and just a nature scene with the leaf as the focal point? If I end up doing another version, I'll post on Fickr. Didn't seem worthy of it yet.
@jgpittenger@888rachel Since I wasn't overly committed to the original, I've played around a bit in picmonkey to make the insect stand out more. The tradeoff was losing the intensity of the orange. I can always replace it with the original again...thought this might be an easy way to post it, but you can't compare to original unfortunately.
@taffy I hate to say this, because the leaf is a lovely shape, but I would crop it. I didn't realise that the dragonfly was so dark naturally. The light on the leaf around the dragonfly is really nice, and I think would look great in a crop.
@888rachel Mmmm...interesting idea...I don't know how much more I can crop, but I'll give it a go. I do hate losing the leaf, but think in this version, it's too bland. When it was brighter orange, I think it would be worth keeping. Ah...it may just be I don't have the skill set yet to make this one work. Something to aspire to when I finally tackle PS
@888rachel@jgpittenger I just replaced version 2 with this one. Tried to take into account Jane's point about space, Rachel's about cropping, others like Amanda who mentioned the curve as being appealing, and those who also said the dragonfly didn't show up well -- making the leaf more important than the insect. Thanks for your thoughts!
There are a million thoughts going through my head now. Well, perhaps not a million, but at least two: what v1 and v2 looked like! I like the colours of the end result, and I think the dragonfly is quite visible enough. The orange leaf forming a curve from corner to corner is interesting - perhaps not as strong and effective as a diagonal, but works nevertheless. I can imagine more crop options, but won't mention or comment on that - it would be better, I think, to work on crop options when I see the original.
Well, I didn't get here early enough to see the original but like this version. You know it occurs to me there is some "architecture" in this shot as the orange becomes an archway. Do you ever think of that when shooting nature?
Can't comment on previous versions, but like this one. Love the gentle curve of the leaf and unlike some others, I like the way the dragonfly blends in, as so much in the natural world is all about blending in, but he's still totally visible.
such fun to read all the possibilities. The weirdest thing is... sometimes the next day you look at v1, v2, v3 etc. and one of them just leaps out. I like this version (only one I've seen) and looked at the dragonfly right off. there is enough light on him that sparkles that you see him fine.
Saw your original square photo, and I really like this crop and editing. Great suggestions for bringing attention to both the dragonfly and curving leaf.
Thanks for posting the originals - It's always inspiring to see the processing steps and learn about how people think about and approach post-processing.
So much better than the original Taffy!! Now I can see the dragon!! I think you were always going to struggle with this one as the colour of the dragon is so dark and you have that dark background battling against it. A great improvement - I like that you have cropped in closer!!
