Pussywillows--Need Help

[Anita Bower]

I'm posting these Pussywillows to get advice on how to get the whites not blown out. Taken indoors, window light on sunny day (same problem when I lowered shades), but no sun directly coming in. I tried different exposures, f stops, ISOs. Same problem, even with dark exposures.

Nikon D300, Sigma 105mm macro, 1/8 sec., f16, ISO 200, manual focus, manual exposure, tripod. RAW conversion in Elements 7, PP in PS7. Brought out details in Topaz Adjust.

Thanks. :)

[Julie Kenward]

Anita, I'm just taking a stab in the dark here as I can't really visualize your set up but here are a couple of suggestions:

1. Since you're telling me the one area at the top was blown out no matter what you did with the light source then my suggestion would be to expose the image for that particular area using spot metering and then bring up the rest of the image in PS with a shadow/highlight adjustment or the sliders in Camera Raw.

2. Another option if you have someone around to help might be to aim a small piece of black board downward onto that bud just outside of the photo's frame and see if that cut the light a bit on that particular area.

3. Did you try moving the branch around so light levels fell in a different place on the branch?

4. Expose the image as you've done here and use the clone tool at 30% opacity and set to "darken" and clone from the middle of that but up to the top to tone it down a bit.

Hope those help!

As for the image...a lovely BG and a beautiful composition that fits nicely in the frame (one of your strong points might I add!) The image does feel like it might have a bit of a soft pink/red cast to it (might just be the twig but it looks that way in the BG as well.) I also think you could use just a smidgeon more contrast to deepen the twig from the buds in tone.

[Anita Bower]

Thanks, Jules. I can always count on your for good suggestions.

Here is a my set up http://www.flickr.com/photos/34370937@N07/3378921738 (http://www.flickr.com/photos/34370937@N07/3378921738 Cat) (Cat is optional.)

I will try suggestions 1, 2 and 4.

I did try differnt angles and moved the twig around.

Probably won't get to it until tomorrow.

Thanks! :)

[Markus Jais]

I like the soft light and colors and the diagonal line. A little more DOF at the top would be great but maybe that would have ruined the BG.

About the whites. Have you tried an HDR? That might help.

Markus

[Anita Bower]

Thank, Markus. I think the images I took at a higher f stop have about the same blur--my lens was fairly close to the pussywillows. HDR is a good idea, but, I've never done HDR and don't have the software for it. :)

[Jackie Schuknecht]

Anita what about shooting at -1/3 for the highlights and then work with the image from there.

[Anita Bower]

I appreciate the suggestions!

Exposing for the highlights and shooting -1/3 for highlights didn't work. I had to severely underexpose. What did work was using a black foam board above and to the right of the fluff. As I think about it now, a grey one might have worked better, darkening the fluff a bit less. I'm delighted to have learned something new and thank you all!

The repost is a new image taken using the black foam board to shade the fluff. I dodged the fluff a bit. I then used Topaz Adjust to bring out some detail and added a texture of my own (Japanese paper) and a vignette. This image probably doesn't belong in this forum, but, I wanted to show it to those who helped me.

Thank you. :)

[Julie Kenward]

Sweet! I'm going to copy the thread down to OOTB so they can see it too!