Never Enough Thyme

[Dennis Bishop]

This cottage, named Never Enough Thyme, is one of the gems of Lakeside, Ohio. The architectural style is attractive, and the property is well-maintained, but it's also because of the spectacular display of flowers. Every year, the area that was to the right when I took this photo is covered with beautiful flowers. The owners plant and water them by hand every year. No wonder the name of the cottage . . .

Nikon D3s, ISO 1250, f/8, nine-exposure HDR at 1 EV increments, zoom lens at 22 mm

processing highlights

• This is actually two sets of HDR images taken 12 minutes apart and processed identically to get the base layer. The backlighting of the flag was better in the earlier set, but there was a car parked across the street.
• The sky wasn't blown out but needed a little more color, so a new one was added.
• Topaz Simplify -- saved watercolor preset, masked to better show the details of the flowers and the stars in the flag
• Alien Skin Snap Art -- saved watercolor wash preset, Hard Light blend mode
• Fractalius -- three saved black-on-white presets; Multiply, Divide, Multiply
• Snap Art -- saved black-on-white edges preset, Multiply
• Simplify -- saved black-on-white edges preset, Multiply and Divide
• background softened with Field Blur
• Anita's use of Filter>Render>Lighting in a recent image inspired me to use it centered behind the flag consistent with the backlighting. Thanks, Anita.
• gradient vignette

[Anita Bower]

This is charming. Excellent job of making the flowers stand out and the bg recede. Your use of Lighting on the flag is excellent! Glad it worked for you. Which light did you use and how did you get it too look like backlighting?

It seems to me you have created presets on a the software filters you mostly use, thus, speeding your processing. I've never saved a present. Maybe I need to think about that.
I would love to see this house and its many flowers.

[Nancy Bell]

Well seen, captured and processed, a la Dennis style! Love this slice of beautiful America! The emphasis on the pinks and the back lighting makes this special and eye catching! p.s. I would never "see" this lovely image. So glad you do!

[Anita Bower]

Well seen, captured and processed, a la Dennis style! Love this slice of beautiful America! The emphasis on the pinks and the back lighting makes this special and eye catching! p.s. I would never "see" this lovely image. So glad you do!

I, too, would not "see" this.

[Dennis Bishop]

Thanks very much for your comments.

presets . . .
For me, saving the presets isn't so much for saving time as it is that there are so many combinations and permutations of sliders, that I'd never be able to reproduce them. It's really a big deal in Fractalius because the three presets I always use together progress from one with very little more than edge darkening to one with a fair amount of gray and squiggles in it. With all the presets, I use opacity and sometimes masking to adjust them for the image.

Render>Lighting Effects . . .
Assuming that the settings are sticky, and it appears that they are, I used Point. It was almost the last step in the processing sequence. I stamped all the layers below and applied the lighting effect centered near the top of the flag. At that point, of course, it was on top of everything. However, I'd spent a long time building a mask so the earlier blurring was confined to the background. It was just the thing to mask the light and make it look like backlighting.

seeing it . . .
Oh, you'd have seen it several days before I shot this. I've walked past this cottage many times at all hours of the day. Several days before, the time and the position of the sun was just perfect, but I was on my way to something and couldn't have stopped even if I'd had my camera with me. I can't remember what happened on the days in between -- rain, clouds, the flag being wrapped around the pole by the breeze??? When I finally captured it all, it really didn't compare with what I'd seen the first time.

[Cheryl Slechta]

Beautiful processing, Dennis. I especially like the lone pink flower against the blue house in the lower left corner.

[Diane Miller]

This is wonderful! All said above. The gorgeous light on the flag was the first thing that caught my eye.

I might have seen it but wouldn't have been able to do anything worthwhile with it.