-- Mark Meyer (mameyer@xsite.net), August 24, 1998

Answers

Nicely done. What film did you use. Is the background sky ?

-- Paul Lenson (lenson@pci.on.ca), August 25, 1998.

dammit, mark, i had planned to put together an image *just like* that one this week. now my originality factor is blown... seriously, this is a nicely composed shot. just a tad underexposed, though, don't you think?

-- wayne harrison (wayno@netmcr.com), August 25, 1998.

I think exp. is perfect. This is a study in yellow/orange and blue. The black stamens are neutral but help to "pop out" the yellow petals.

-- Paul Lenson (lenson@pci.on.ca), August 25, 1998.

There is no detail in the stemma, they are underexposed because the tonal range of subject exceeds capacity of film. Use of a defuser, fill light or shooting on overcast day would have fixed it. If the contrasty effect is desired, you can also use soft light and push the film 1 stop for really effective results.

-- Lester LaForce (102140.1200@compuserve.com), August 25, 1998.

This image looks unreal to me.

It appears to be a studio shot - the combination of soft light on the flower and the very lightly diffused clouds in the "sky" AND the yellowish piece of "sky" in the upper right make me think so. The yellowish bit in the upper right might be a leaf, but it has no visible structure and yet the "sky" does. Also, since this is a close-up of the flower (I estimate that the flower is about 3 or 4 inches in diameter, maybe less), it seems like there should not be enough DOF to include those wispy cloud-like things.

So, how did you do it?

Frank

-- Frank Kolwicz (bb389@lafn.org), August 25, 1998.

The image is artistic, unreal (just a little bit too unreal) and the colors and tones that stand out carry the image. Well composed and perfectly exposued.

-- bahman farzad (bahman_farzad@mindspring.com), August 26, 1998.

To answer a few of the questions:
The film is velvia(35mm) shot with the Pentax 100mm macro and underexposed a little to get a deeper yellow. The disagreement about the "correctness" of exposure is interesting and further proof of the subjective nature of exposure. I guess since this is what I wanted, the exposure is correct although I needed to depart from the "correct" exposure to get the colors this way. Hmm...
Regarding Frank's observations, this was indeed done indoors. The lighting is from a big (25 feet high) window in direct light with a reflector filling the shadows. The "sky" is really a piece of blue cardboard held a few inches behind the flower. The yellow area in the upper-left is actually another flower which is more out of focus than the "sky" because it is behind it. Not intentional, but it will be cropped when used for the purpose of the shot (letterhead design). I'm not intimate with the PSA rules so I hope this doesn't present a hand of man problem. How does it work if you can't tell it's cardboard?
I'm a little suprised that no one has suggested an alternate cropping due to the empty space on the right. I was expecting some disa

-- Mark Meyer (MaMeyer@xsite.net), August 26, 1998.

The empty space on the left is absolutely needed to balance the composition. Nevertheless, as an abstract I find it boring. Have seen a) better pictures of sunflowers and b) better pictures featuring the colors yellow and blue as the main topic.

-- (andreas@physio.unr.edu), August 27, 1998.