White Christmas Rose

[Anita Bower]

Taken yesterday at Longwood Gardens Conservatory, natural light, tripod, 1/2 sec., f32, ISO 200, manual exposure, auto WB, Konica Minolta 5D, 100 macro. Post processing in PS7, levels, contrast, saturationg, clone to clean it up, burn to darken some areas. I may have been heavy handed with the burn.
I'm experimenting with using f32, which I rarely use.

[Mike Moats]

Hey Anita, I like the comp and the lighting. It needs more sharpening, as the center is soft. If your sharpening in a layer go back in a crank up the sharpening. I set all my images at about 250% and it works out fine.

[Ed Vatza]

Hi Anita,

I agree that the center looks soft but I am not sure why since the petals look good and at f/32 you would think that the stamens would also be sharp. The other thing I would say is that the flower is too tight in the frame. I think you need more room around the flower on left, right and top. Comp is nice. Nice time for Longwood Gardens. I need to get there this winter.

[Anita Bower]

Here it is sharpened more and also with the green background a bit lighter. I can't add more around the flower because this is how I took the photo. I do see what you mean, though, Ed. I, too, am puzzled by the lack of sharpness in the center.

[Mike Moats]

Hey Anita, the repost looks much better. For this image I would have set my focus point right on the yellow center, not knowing where your main focus ended up its hard to say why only the center was soft. Your in pretty close so even at f32 your DOF shrinks, so if your main focus ended up deeper into the image it could be why the center was soft. You may be able to take the sharpening up even more without hurting the image.

[Julie Kenward]

I agree with Mike - make that center of the flower be your focal point. I don't know what kind of camera or lens you are shooting with but if it has the ability to take it down to a single focal point instead of multi-focal, then do that and get that baby right on the stamen next time.

Also, I liked the darker green BG against the white. You still had a hint of color but it really set those whites off nicely.