Leopard Print Leaf

[Julie Kenward]

I was photographing mushrooms in a heavily forested area this morning when I came upon this leaf. It had such an interesting pattern on it that I couldn't pass it up. I processed it in Camera Raw, then moved it into Photoshop to try a number of things. I finally decided to cut and paste it to a black BG because the leaf pattern was so busy that it looked overwhelming with all the little sticks and blades of grass around it.

I ended up producing four or five versions of the same photo but this one turned out to be my favorite. If I remember right I applied a toned action to it and then did a color balance to reduce the green and take it more towards the silver/brown tones.

Canon 40D, EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM
ISO 640 (very heavy shadows on the forest floor)
f/3.5 @ 1/60th, handheld (but well braced!)
Eval metering, AWB

[Alfred Forns]

Julie could be my favorite so far !!!! Wouldn't touch a thing !!!! I think nothing would have worked as well as this black bg and goes so well !!! Big Congrats !!!

[Fabs Forns]

This could be a good candidate for hand tinting too!!!!!! Back sets it up really nice!

[Arthur Morris]

This one is perfect as is for me. You have a great eye and emply some wonderful creative techniques. Glad that I dropped in here!