Explosion of Flowers

lifeinfocus · July 5, 2012

Wife's daylily garden is exploding. There are over 60,000 registered daylilies and my wife is trying to corner the market - well, not really. But the deer in our area are happy, and my wife is fighting back with new methods to keep them from being eaten. One of them is me capturing them before they get to them.

Here are some recent ones.

COMMENTS appreciated.

1

2

3 - Early in the morning and this one is still opening.

4 Early morning sun back light.

5 Like the dark colored ones.

6 This was begging not to be shot straight on.

7. Like the silver anther (one of two parts of the stamen) on this one.

kdog · July 7, 2012

Really nice set with excellent exposures and colors. The flower seems pretty centered on most of these. I'm wondering if some of these would look even better with rule of thirds compositions. Not to detract from the excellent work here, mind you.

lifeinfocus · July 7, 2012

kdog wrote: »

Really nice set with excellent exposures and colors. The flower seems pretty centered on most of these. I'm wondering if some of these would look even better with rule of thirds compositions. Not to detract from the excellent work here, mind you.

Thanks and a valid comment about centering.

I more often have used rule of thirds, or a more interesting composition when taking photos of daylilies. It seems that lately I have not and I think it may be because of the influence of being a member of a daylily club http://www.daylilies.me.

Most of the members are hybrizers, or avid growers and their goals are to hybridize a new daylily - size, color, reblooming, number of stalks, and much more. So, for them I think a photo of a daylily is more about capturing the true color, size etc. than an artistic view.

I have found that capturing redish daylilies colors can be difficult. I often try to replicate the true color of the daylily as I see it when I take the photo. Not always easy to do.

I use manual settings, tripod and timer to get as best a focus as possible and accurate color representation. Early morning hours is the best time to capture color and a still daylily - less wind then, and best light. In the evening the flower is often spent and ready to be removed, hence the name "day"lily.

Thanks for your comments,
Phil

Here is an example of a less centered composition:

Caption for this one is "You can try but you cannot hide"

rob marshall · July 8, 2012

A good set - you have captured the colours very well. I think #3, 6, and 7 would benefit in presentation by using a square crop. Have you tried underexposing for the background (to partly hide it) and using a diffused flash, in manual mode, just on the flower? I notice that one of your shots was just 1/50s - and if it's windy you may show some movement. Although I have to say they all look pretty sharp.

black mamba · July 8, 2012

I like this body of work very much. I think your efforts to present these flowers in their most accurate state ( colors and such ) trumps other considerations....such as the centering of the subjects. Since this was mainly a documentary endeavor, the " artsy " approach can wait its turn.

Well done,

Tom

lifeinfocus · July 8, 2012

rob marshall wrote: »

A good set - you have captured the colours very well. I think #3, 6, and 7 would benefit in presentation by using a square crop. Have you tried underexposing for the background (to partly hide it) and using a diffused flash, in manual mode, just on the flower? I notice that one of your shots was just 1/50s - and if it's windy you may show some movement. Although I have to say they all look pretty sharp.

Thanks for your comments. I have not used a flash yet, but I am planning on trying that this week. Regarding shutter speed at 1/50s, it was a very still day and I was able to shoot at that slow a speed, 200 ISO and probably a higher f/stop than usual.

Thanks much,
Phil

lifeinfocus · July 8, 2012

black mamba wrote: »

I like this body of work very much. I think your efforts to present these flowers in their most accurate state ( colors and such ) trumps other considerations....such as the centering of the subjects. Since this was mainly a documentary endeavor, the " artsy " approach can wait its turn.

Well done,

Tom

Thanks. I enjoy capturing them and adding captions in a gallery to help tell the flower season. Plus, I sometimes toss in some additional photos like the pic of a plastic snake, which is used to try and scare away flower eating critters. We don't know if it works, but it was added to the mix this year. Deer are hard to chase away.

lifeinfocus · July 8, 2012

With and W/O Flash
Same daylily with and without TTL flash, Rogue Flashbender to diffuse light. There is a difference, but looks like I need to modify diffuser more and zoom on flash perhaps to see more of a difference. Exact same post processing settings.

The difference is very subtle. I will have to wait until tomorrow morning to get a fresh set of daylilies as today's are already starting to show some aging since this morning.

NO Flash

With TTL Flash

rob marshall · July 8, 2012

lifeinfocus wrote: »

Same daylily with and without TTL flash, Rogue Flashbender to diffuse light. There is a difference, but looks like I need to modify diffuser and zoom on flash perhaps to see more of a difference. Exact same post processing settings.

The difference is very subtle. I will have to wait until tomorrow morning to get a fresh set of daylilies as today's are already starting to show some aging since this morning.

Try turning the exposure for the background down about 1-2 stops and let the flower be lit at a normal level by a mixture of ambient and flash. I did this one in that way, as I recall http://www.robmarshall.net/Images/Botanic/13793701_N72FQM#!i=1309140384&k=RQ7zzcd If you have some distance behind the flower, a low level of flash will not make much impact on the background, but should light the flower nicely. You need to experiment with it, as it depends on the available ambient light.

lifeinfocus · July 9, 2012

rob marshall wrote: »

Try turning the exposure for the background down about 1-2 stops and let the flower be lit at a normal level by a mixture of ambient and flash. I did this one in that way, as I recall http://www.robmarshall.net/Images/Botanic/13793701_N72FQM#!i=1309140384&k=RQ7zzcd If you have some distance behind the flower, a low level of flash will not make much impact on the background, but should light the flower nicely. You need to experiment with it, as it depends on the available ambient light.

Beautiful images in your gallery. Thanks for your help. Looks like a good morning to experiment.

Phil

rob marshall · July 9, 2012

lifeinfocus wrote: »

Beautiful images in your gallery. Thanks for your help. Looks like a good morning to experiment.

Phil

Thank you, Phil.

I was going to have a go myself this morning - there's a very nice day lily in our garden, but it's just started raining. :cry

lifeinfocus · July 9, 2012

Experiment With and W/0 Flash
Here are two images of same flower. First one is with no flash, not as closeup, and aperture priority - exact same post processing in LR. The other is taken with manual flash 1/32 power, manual exposure, underexposed, and FlashBender to diffuse light - bent somewhat like a snoot.

I like number two, but the colors using the flash and Vivid LR post processing do not convey the true colors of this daylily. Tradeoff between accurate color and artisitic impression?

My wife's first impressions were - with flash - not an accurate represenatation of the true color.

Phil

NO Flash

With Flash

rob marshall · July 9, 2012

Phil

Your wife is correct, but not just because all wives are correct. Your WB is wrong, that's all. I took your (hope you don't mind an edit) flash shot and put it into CS6 RAW edit and reduced (cooled) the WB. I also lightened the flower a little which affects the colour a bit. I think you didn't quite have enough flash power. You need to make sure the WB setting is correct.

Don't know if you shoot in RAW, but for flower shots it's always the best way because WB can change the colours of flowers so much, and you can't change the WB of JPEGS unless you use the RAW editor. Better to do it in RAW to start with. Reds are a particular problem!

I've just shot some myself - I'll post them later in another thread.

lifeinfocus · July 9, 2012

rob marshall wrote: »

Phil

Your wife is correct, but not just because all wives are correct. Your WB is wrong, that's all. I took your (hope you don't mind an edit) flash shot and put it into CS6 RAW edit and reduced (cooled) the WB. I also lightened the flower a little which affects the colour a bit. I think you didn't quite have enough flash power. You need to make sure the WB setting is correct.

I've just shot some myself - I'll post them later in another thread.

Hmm! I will make those adjustments next time. Thanks.

I am trying to capture an image like this dgrin posting http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?p=1795243#post1795243 daylily. Not sure if the color is accurate in that image though.

Thanks
Phil

rob marshall · July 9, 2012

lifeinfocus wrote: »

Hmm! I will make those adjustments next time. Thanks.
I am trying to capture an image like this dgrin posting http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?p=1795243#post1795243 daylily. Not sure if the color is accurate in that image though.

Thanks
Phil

Looking at the shot you refer to I'd say it looks too warm on WB. I turned it down a little, and it looks better. Mind you, I wasn't there, but from a purely aesthetic viewpoint it looks better cooler. The give-away, with flowers, is often in the green stems and leaves. If the WB is too warm they will look too red.

Explosion of Flowers

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