Swirling Bougainvillea

I photographed the brilliant bougainvillea in a stunning garden in San Jose, Costa Rica last winter. The swirling is a photoshop filter, spin radial blur. When I looked closely at the bougainvillea I noticed each flower had a white center. One of those became the focal point of this blur. I left just a few un-blurred flowers on the edge to give a bit of reality. I am still at the stage of just using one or two effects at a time. I am very impressed with those postings having a multitude of effects and I am setting a goal of working towards that! Thanks to all for such wonderful inspiration.

Critiques, comments very welcome.

Nancy, Welcome back-hope your trip was fantastic and I'm looking forward to seeing your images. I remember the first one of these that I did. I fell in love w/ the filter. Did you know that Cindy Cone won IOTY in OOTB using this technique as her base. I love the bright Bougainvillea color and the way you got the white center in the center of your twirl! You can also experiment w/ cropping and using the white center as a ROT point. Lots can be done w/ this filter, you can do two separate layers twirling in different directions and blend them together w/ one of the blend modes or w/ layer masks. Have fun and share your experiments with us!!:)

I too like the colour of red and the white center. Swirls are fun and Denise has given some interesting suggestions.

For me, the stuff that you left on the edges is distracting. Thus the repost:) In this case, tighter is righter! Also did a bit of color work....

I do like the way you focused on the central part of the flower. As Denise mentioned, I do love experimenting with twirls. In addition to the radial blur, I also use Photoshop Distort/Twirl. Denise has some good suggestions. I like adding layers and blending or erasing some of the effects. The experimentation part is what is fun.

Thank you all for the suggestions! The experimentation is great fun!