Quote:

---

# Exposure Time (1 / Shutter Speed) = 1/400 second = 0.0025 second
# Lens F-Number/F-Stop = 28/5 = F5.6

---

I think your clock is set wrong on the camera as it lists this as taken at 11:01 PM.

A lot of folks in the macro / flora world don't like totally dark backgrounds, but I really prefer them, so that's a plus for me on this one.

Composition wise, I don't usually like to clip the ends of petals or anything else at the edge of a frame, but that is really a matter of personal choice. So, I like the flower coming from the lower left corner, but would prefer more space all around the other three edges.

Some of the whites are considerably brighter than other areas of white. The are not, however, completely blown out so you can easily tone down the exposure in those areas using a multiplying layer and a quick mask, especially if you shot RAW. (let me know if you would like more details)

Hope this helps.
Jim

Quote:

---

Hi, Jim. Thanks. This is incredibly helpful. Can you pls tell me how you got the EXIF (and what exactly those letters stand for)? I've been trying to figure that one out for ages! Generally, I write it all down in a small notebook, but that gets tiring....

Again, many thanks.
--Shannon

---

Quote:

---

I've looked at this photo so long I don't really see it anymore. Would love some helpful remarks to improve it and my skills overall. This was taken Outdoors in natural light with no artificial backgrounds, reflectors, etc. Probably f2.8; 1/500--Sorry, I didn't write it down....

I'm posting this to another forum as well for more help. Apologies if you read both and see it again.

Many thanks.

---

Shannon,

My disclaimer here is that I'm making no pretenses that my opinions are any better than yours or anybody else's. I will be happy to tell you what I would do if this were mine.

The exposure here is right on and that can definitely be tricky with white flowers on a black background.

My problem with the image is the composition. I would want this to be about the flowers and the big black space on the right distracts me from the flowers and makes the image look unbalances to me. I like unbalanced images when there's a purpose, but this is just pulling my eyes away from the flowers. So I would crop it differently. The other problem I have is that the flowers themselves are a little busy and there isn't much for the eye to focus on. I don't mean that the flowers are out of focus, rather everything is in focus and my eyes just skip around until it gets drawn into the black space. What I would do is add some selective sharpening to the stamens of the flowers to draw the eye to rest on the interior of the flowers (this is subtle but can be effective). To give you an idea, I've taken the liberty of editing your web pic and incorporationg my ideas. The sharpening doesn't work that well with this low res web pic, but with the full res pic, I think it would work.

That's my $.02. Hope it helps.

Geo

Here is is with cropping and selective sharpening



Original for reference