Hi Byron , I like the idea behind this shot and yet feel distant from this subject. The problem is of course the weeds poking through and the rocks that over power this image despite their somewhat small part in this picture. Also you seem a little hazy on the choice of aperture. I feel you should make a choice have something completly fuzzed or everything tack sharp for myself there just isnt an inbetween so if you want to show texture - get it sharp by using a higher aperture like f8 or even f11 and mount the camera on something.
of course with enogh photoshop work you could make this photo salvageable but why bother spending two hours croping off the whole left side and the rock off the top cloning in an extra to remove the weed in the centre and solarizing via curves selectivly desaturating then sharpening just to get an image in the same time as it would take as a lesurly stroll to your local garden centre to take a fern shot just after sprinkling it with water.
hope this helps you understand that sometimes its more sense to take more than one shot/angle of something that sparks your interest especially since you only keep the best ones.
Hi Byron, I'm in agreement with the others here that this image itself isn't easy to improve. I think you're missing a strong focal point, to draw the viewer's interest. A vibrant coloured flower alone among the ferns for example, or a rabbit in the middle of it or some such thing. As it is to get a pleasing sense of scale, I also think you'd have to go in closer, reduce the number of ferns in your image. A flower, or fungus, framed by four or five fern stems or something along those lines might be a far more promising subject. Best of luck Chris
I'm not sure you can do anything with this image, but that doesn't mean you have to give up on this subject. Here's a couple of ideas which may or may not work in combination or on their own: Shoot from a low position. Use a telelens to contract depth. Do a much more close-up shot. If you want to shoot in colour, find a fern that would be of different colour than the other ferns in the frame. Shoot B&W to emphasise lines and textures. Lose the white bits showing through in this image.
Hi Byron - Your picture is imposibble to crop for an improvement, there are too many details. Try and find a more simple object to shot, then you can start cropping. Regards Ivan
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{K:24381} 10/11/2003