Cactus Bloom

Would love to know what yall think about this photo. This was taken in

our horse pasture down here in south Texas. Thanks!

It's a beautiful composition that has a lot of tension in it. My eye starts at bottom left and heads towards the flowers. But there is a strong diagonal from bottom right to top left (following the tops of the cactus pads) that takes my eye towards the caption ("Fischer Photography"). So my eye ends up moving from the flowers to the caption and back again.

 

I tried covering up the writing with my hand and the space at top left immediately looks too empty. So I think this composition is perfect for advertising or some other purpose that would require a small caption. Making the writing the same colour as the cactus flowers was a great choice. If the writing were, say, red, I would tend to focus more on the flowers. If it were a more vivid colour than the flowers, it would completely distract me from the flowers.

 

You must have shot this under partially cloudy conditions, which is perfect for the subject. And the (very!) long lens has helped to blur out the background.

 

For my taste, the colours are too saturated. It looks as if you have either overdone (again, to my taste) the saturation setting or added a soft light layer and left the opacity rather high. This look is quite fashionable at the moment, but I think one day we will look back and say that colours like these look dated and rather "early 21st century". Especially the flowers (even more than the pads) would have benefited from masking out some of the added saturation because it makes it harder to see the crystalline structure of the petals.

 

Still, it's a very nice photo. Well seen, and very well framed!

 

Attractive colors an simple composition. Light bit harsh on the yellow flowers depriving texture of the petals. Consider removing th partial leaves in both lower corners. Since it is in back yard try it in a softer light with main focus at the flowers and bracket you exposure. Thanks for sharing.

Thanks for your input guys! I shot this on a cloudy day around noon with my 600mm. I slightly cropped it to get rid of the other dead blooms. I figured if I cropped it more, it wouldn't look as good. Thanks!!

Focus and dof is very good, the composition is a bit awkward, my eye just can`t decide on the subject, but I can`t explain why. I have looked at it some more, and I think it would look more balanced with an odd number of yellow flowers, even numbers of subjects just don`t balance very well. You did about as good as can be with what you saw.

I have taken dozens of photos of cactus flowers, and am always amazed that it is so hard to get good ones! For my eye, the cactus on the left balances the two flowers and gives it enough of a "thirds" composition. I think it's beautiful. The only thing I'd do is clone out the little pieces in the bottom corners.