A couple of flowers

[AV6Scott]

A couple of flower pictures taken at the arboretum. They seem pretty good to me, but I would like the opinions of some better trained eyes.

http://img145.imageshack.us/img145/4595/flower02lx5.jpg
http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/7267/flower13fv5.jpg
http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/6509/flower17eh5.jpg
http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/772/flower24tz5.jpg

[Flo]

Beautiful colors..I like the third one the best...watch out for trying to center all the shots..it's nice to have something peek at you from the sidelines;)

[EOSBoy]

I'm not really much a flower guy, but #3 is definitely the best and a very great shot. It makes me happy looking at it. And it doesn't happen much. This is def. a printable one.

[loony33]

Number 3 wow.
Number 1 is nice, but a little too crowded. I would've used a smaller aperture but I realize that at this focal length a shallow dop in the foreground elements might be hard.

[AV6Scott]

Beautiful colors..I like the third one the best...watch out for trying to center all the shots..it's nice to have something peek at you from the sidelines;)

Yeah, I try to stay with the rule of thirds, but for I seem to center objects when it is focused on one primary thing.

I'm not really much a flower guy, but #3 is definitely the best and a very great shot. It makes me happy looking at it. And it doesn't happen much. This is def. a printable one.

Thanks. There was another one like it but the focus was on the front and I didn't feel that it was nearly as strong of a picture.

Number 3 wow.
Number 1 is nice, but a little too crowded. I would've used a smaller aperture but I realize that at this focal length a shallow dop in the foreground elements might be hard.

I thought I had used f4 when I took the first picture but I guess I didn't. It probably would have been really nice to have a very limited DOF with it focused on the white flower.

Thanks for the critiques guys. I didn't expect number 3 to be that well responded too. It felt pretty good, but number 2 appeals to me more.

[kirkt]

Here's a mocked up DoF'ed version of No. 1. I think 1 was also overexposed, so I opened the JPEG in Camera Raw, did some recovery and then a small Lab curves move in CS3, with a little lens blur to finish it off - I did not bother to make a good DoF mask for the background trees, so the blur on them does not make physical sense. The DoF is really necessary in 1 to calm the exploding background. Nice shots, especially in the middle of the day - maybe next time under these conditions take some bracketed exposures to make sure.

Kirk

[AV6Scott]

Thanks Kirkt. I didn't even realize it was overexposed. The colors look much better after you fixed it.

[Apshiso]

I like the fix but would probably take out the tag on the flower - If I were in PS anyway. - Nice shots!!

Oh, and I agree - I like #2 as well - it's just not as happy and bright.

I hate you guys from Texas! Middle of the darn winter and your taking flower pictures - Sheez;)

[AV6Scott]

I like the fix but would probably take out the tag on the flower - If I were in PS anyway. - Nice shots!!

Oh, and I agree - I like #2 as well - it's just not as happy and bright.

I hate you guys from Texas! Middle of the darn winter and your taking flower pictures - Sheez;)

Middle of winter? Haha, it's almost summer here. Give it a couple more weeks.

[Atheist]

#3 is amazing!