Moss

[Caleb Royer]

I was walking around in some woods in my back yard and came upon this moss that looked very interesting in the warm sunlight that shone down on it, even without a close-up view from my camera.

Canon 40D
Canon EF-S 60mm f/2.8 lens
aperture: f/2.8
shutter speed: 1/200 sec
ISO: 100
Flash did not fire
Shot around 4:00
Clear skies
The lens was focused just about as close as it would go, I think. :o

Comments much appreciated!

[Dave Leroy]

Very interesting looking photo. It looks like it could be underwater plants swaying in the currents. I really like the colours. It would also be interesting with more DoF. Well done to catch the light at a good time. Dave

[Mike Fuhr]

Love the colors and background. Nice angle for the foreground also. I think the DoF is right on and adds to the overall comp. I might crop off the rt side slightly to remove the tips.

[Caleb Royer]

Mike, I cropped the tips off the right side of the photo and it looks a little better. I also made the version above that is cropped to 2124x1416 (the original was 3888x2592).

[Julie Kenward]

Very original image, Caleb! Even with all that is going on that one stem in the left third (looks like it's been burned) catches my eye and holds it there. Beautiful lighting coming down - I bet this would also work around 8 a.m. as well.

I wonder if you also tried any other aperture settings? I like what you have here but would be curious to see what f4 and f5.6 also looked like.

I think you could bring the light tones up just a bit in levels but that's your choice. I pushed the white slider to 240 and it really popped those burgandies and greens.

[Caleb Royer]

Very original image, Caleb! Even with all that is going on that one stem in the left third (looks like it's been burned) catches my eye and holds it there....
I agree.


I wonder if you also tried any other aperture settings? I like what you have here but would be curious to see what f4 and f5.6 also looked like.
I haven't been doing nature photography for long, so at the time I wasn't smart enough to try different aperture settings.

[Julie Kenward]

I totally understand. Even when you think you've "got it" on the viewfinder it never hurts to crank out another one at a higher and lower aperture - just for the heck of it. You never know when the one you love is the second or third in the series.

Nicely done, Caleb...hope to see you around here some more!

[Jerry van Dijk]

Hi Caleb, nice image! I think that lowering aperture like Julie suggested would create a much more messy image. I like how the moss stems in the FG stand out from the rest. I've made similar images with that result, leaving no clear subject to look at.
I must say that your image only really drew my attention when I was scrolling down and the lighter top part was cut of, creating a panorama crop. I've taken the liberty to mess with your image to show what I mean, hope you don't mind. I also followed up on Julies advice to lighten up the image a little. Also added a tiny bit of sharpness. See what you think of the result.
- Jerry -
http://i34.tinypic.com/c6sya.jpg

[Anita Bower]

There is something I like best in each of the versions posted. Overall, I like the little landscape you captured. Great point of view.
In the original image, I love the bokeh, but would crop more from the right to eliminate the light colored leaf on lower right side.
I like the close-up look of the second and third, and the lighter quality of the third.
Hope to see more.

[Caleb Royer]

Thank you everyone for the kind words and help. Jerry, I like what you've done with my image. It looks better lightened up. It is hard to see how sharp the photos are on this form. As Anita said, it would look better if the right side of the pano photo was cropped a little to get rid of the white leaf.

[denise ippolito]

Caleb, Interesting with nice details. I'm not a big fan of pano crops but Jerry's repost really is nice.