Theme - Blowing in the Wind

[Cheryl Slechta]

I did lots of blurs while I was in the Palouse (I can't help myself:S3:). We stopped to take some images of an old barn in and the nicest man came out of the house to talk to us. He'd lived there all his life (it had been his uncle's house and he was born across the road) and was especially proud of his flowers. He had a gorgeous stand of poppies at the entrance to his property which we photographed and then he invited us around to the back of his house to look at the rest of his flowers - he had some nice iris in the back. The wind was blowing pretty hard so I used a long exposure (2.5 seconds) and let the wind do the blurring for me. We met some of the nicest people in our wanderings around the Palouse. Everyone was friendly and went out of their way to be helpful.

[gary ellwein]

Hi Cheryl, delighted to hear you had a wonderful and productive scouting trip to the Palouse. The bright poppies are nicely displayed on the soft green bg. If mine, I would try eliminating the group in the left upper corner. With the wind in my part of the country , I could experiment with this technique on most days.

[Paul Lagasi]

A good all around blur, you can almost feel the wind. I do agree with above about the flowers in the top left, its the first thing I thought of. Stay safe, happy travels. You and I still have to find that King Rail at Paynes Prairie.

[Nancy Bell]

I have discovered patches of poppies around quite a few old homesteads. They must be hardy to survive generations of families! You & the wind worked well together. Really like all the diffuse lines & greens of the leaves and stems as bgkd to the orange-red flowers. If you go back to work on this, I would consider removing that bit of red in the center near the bottom and the squiggly white line to the left.

[Diane Miller]

Very nice! And great that the wind did all the blurring for you!

When I'm shooting blurs (which are never a pleasing as this one!) I try to go with a looser composition (wider angle) so I don't cut things off at the edges. IQ isn't a big factor with blurs so you can crop more freely than with a shot where you want sharp detail.

[Jackie Schuknecht]

I love the blurs and I love the colours Cheryl! Did you change the WB in post? Or did you set it in-camera?

[Cheryl Slechta]

Thanks, all, for your comments. There was quite a bit of sunlight to the rear of the poppies in the upper left so I like the upper left the way it is because it reminds me of what I saw. I agree about the red little poppy in the middle but I don't mind the light squiggles.:S3:

[Cheryl Slechta]

Hi, Jackie, thanks. I was shooting Auto WB and I just checked LR and I didn't change it. I did de-saturate the reds just a click or two so that they didn't overpower the light greens.:S3:



I love the blurs and I love the colours Cheryl! Did you change the WB in post? Or did you set it in-camera?

[Arthur Morris]

I love the blurred effect and the colors but agree with folks about the flowers in the upper left.....