Unfolding From the Depths

Aaron, this is beautiful, excllent macro. Congrats - Sean

Accomplished use of PS technique to creat a work of art. (If this was basically un-PSed, raise grade from A to A+)

Jack, glad you like it. Surprisingly, there is very little PS here (less than the color version even), only my standard B+W technique. In this case, mostly the green channel and a bit of red channel to give the tendrils some punch! I didn't even dodge and burn, which is strange for me.

 

There are mercy B's, mercy A's, but never mercy A+'s!

thanks for any thoughts!

 

cheers,

Aaron

Excellent tonal range and composition. The shallow DOF works very nicely here. One of those "I wish I'd taken this" images. Beautiful.

Beautiful photo. It really pop out. Really well done, bravo.

Aaron, this is another great shot. The B&W treatment is excellent. How did you light this?

Hi Jeff,

 

this is natural light! West facing wall late in the afternoon so the sun was at about a 30 degree angle and still fairly intense. I shot it with my 180mm macro lens almost wide open.

 

Here is the V50 transparency:

Thanks Aaron, the B&W is definitely the way to go. This works so well and breaks most of my macro preconceptions along the way. The shadows add another dimension and the intentionally shallow DOF lifts it further.

Or, burst into life. B/W is exceptional & sensational.

These are really stunning B&W tones. How did you get them?

Very simply, by using the channel mixer. Because the flower was so magenta, the green and blue channels really affected the background tonality. This is part of a dipthych where the other is very high key. Increasing the red channel gave intensity to the tendrils.

thanks a lot for this aaron, will try something similar in the future. it gives really striking tones, this is a top image!

Very effective use of shallow DOF. Great B&W image.

A stunning image -- as Jeff said, it exceeds my expectations from macro. The DOF seems just right, and the tonal range gives it great impact.

Very beautiful!