Floating blue

[Desmond Chan]

105f2.8 VR on D700 hand-held. ISO 800 f7.1 1/400s.

Outdoor, all natural light on a cloudy day.

Darkened the background and enhanced the tonal contrast of the flower itself. Background is an out-of-focus flower bed.

Comments welcome and appreciated. Thank you for looking !!

[Ken Childs]

Desmond, the lighting and colors of this cool flower are very nice but with just the edges OOF, it has me wanting a lot more or a lot less in focus. Still it's worth saving. I think since the flower is right in the middle, you might consider a square crop and try darkening the green areas by the LR and UR parts of the flower.

[Desmond Chan]

but with just the edges OOF,

That's my concern, too :(

[Daniel Cadieux]

I find myself staring into the "eye" of the flower...very cool! I like the comp as is, but agree on darkening some of the green areas. The few drops of water add interest, but I'm wondering if a bit more of them would have been nice (got a spray-bottle handy?). Very rich colours, and I like the enhanced contrast.

[Anita Bower]

Love it. This blue is a color I adore, so that makes the image work for me. However, I love the details, how the little petals curve in the middle, the composition, the detail, the darker bg.

[Julie Kenward]

I also love the contrast and the little petals that curl in the center. I really don't like the OOF petal edges, though. As Ken stated, you either want to see more in focus or more OOF.

Comp-wise, I think pulling in the sides to either a square or a vertical crop would really give this a boost.

[Christopher Miller]

Very nice, Ken. Love the colors and soft BG. The beautiful detail in the flower center draws me right in. Agree with suggestions above on the composition. The OOF edges bother me a little bit, but not a lot.

[Desmond Chan]

Thanks for the comments - especially on the use of OOF that I never thought about before - and suggestions, everybody !

[Roman Kurywczak]

Hey Desmond,
Love the colors and agree with suggestions given above. I will add that when you find something like this that you really like.....try bracketing the dof.....f11 at 1/160 sec.....add reflector to bounce some added light......probably get you to f16.....or lower the iso and get down to f4. Seeing them side by side and comparing them gives you a better feel of how sharp or how soft you want the image to be.