Be gentle with me

but let me have it. I want to shoot better pics.

flat, poorly composed, poorly processed.

a little time in ACR and you get...

I like how you got down close to the flower's level rather than looking down on them. I like the placement of the background color, in fact more would be even better. When doing macro or close-up photography a very slight move, to the left or right, will change the background dramatically. It's good that you have a sharp focus on the pistol of the flowers (I believe they're called that). A little more DOF (depth of field) would improve this image. Just enough DOF to put the rest of the subject flower's petals in focus but not so much as to make the background too sharp.

I also think including less room above the subject flowers and more, if not all, of the lower flower would give you a more pleasing composition. Tweaking the curves, contrast etc., adding some saturation, and cloning or healing some of the flaws would also improve this image.

This is a nice shot and most people who see it will like it. There's always room for improvement though. I don't think I've ever shot anything that I thought was perfect. If you really want to shoot better pictures like this, you could go shoot similar shots using the tips that people write here. We probably all could learn from doing it one more time. Not too many flowers blooming here in Kansas City this time of year, I'd have to find some indoor. Hope you find this helpful. Jeff

It just seems a little dull and dark to me. Nothing really pops out. I did a curves adjustment to bump the colors a bit. I cropped to give the flowers a better positioning. I sharpened to bring out more texture. I slightly raised the brightness and contrast.

MarineManiac wrote in post #9088214
flat, poorly composed, poorly processed.

a little time in ACR and you get...

no... this is not better...

Thanx for the tips. My original image seemed blown out to me, like your redo of it. Ill post the original if I can

obnoxiousmom: that looks good.

Heres my original raw converted to JPG nothing else was done on this one

canonnoob wrote in post #9088287
no... this is not better...

thanks for taking the time to critique my critique. your contribution was indispensable!

MarineManiac wrote in post #9088438
thanks for taking the time to critique my critique. your contribution was indispensable!

no problem....

Torkk, if you went from that Raw to what you had, then you had already made a huge amount of improvement! Im still struggling with getting the picture better in RAW so that I dont have to make so many corrections once I get it into an editing program.

That picture is definitely blown in RAW. What time of day and light were you taking these in? It looks like your ISO was way too high and your shutter speed was actually pretty low. But then you used a flash? Give me an idea of what and how you were shooting

obnoxiousmom wrote in post #9088580
Torkk, if you went from that Raw to what you had, then you had already made a huge amount of improvement! Im still struggling with getting the picture better in RAW so that I dont have to make so many corrections once I get it into an editing program.

That picture is definitely blown in RAW. What time of day and light were you taking these in? It looks like your ISO was way too high and your shutter speed was actually pretty low. But then you used a flash? Give me an idea of what and how you were shooting

Indoor with onboard flash
shutter 1/60 f/4.5 ISO 800

What mode were you shooting in?

I would say you need to either bring the ISO down if you have to use your on board flash or turn your iso up high enough to not have to use the flash at all. I try to keep my shutter speed no less than 100 but minimal 80 to prevent fuzzy pictures unless of course you want to use a tri-pod.

Also, making sure you get the things you are shooting in the right spots to bring a persons attention to them is one of the first things I was taught. Use the rule of thirds

You seem to have some really good photos in your photography blog.

These interpretations look over processed to my eye, the original is flat. If one can master shooting flowers everything else should be a breeze. Personally I think natural light is the best light for flowers and it takes some real effort to derive a great composition, see the 2nd sentence. Studio lighting is the next best thing. I recommend shooting a lot and carefully examining the quality of light and compositional arrangement in a frame.

^Basically what I was saying.