Yellow Asiatic Lily

[Derek1945]

I brought a bunch of flowers for my wife to celebrate our 48th wedding anniversary and this lily was in the arrangement. Comments and critique welcomed

[Bjørn Rørslett]

A nice rendition of a beautiful flower. Perhaps one could wish for even softer light to reduce shadows even further.

I find black backgrounds to be a challenge as it is all too easy for contours of the main subject to be "eaten" by the darkness. Thus it is frequently required to have a small rim lighting to counteract this problem.

In a studio setting, all of the above is easily accomplished. For more impromptu arrangements, use indirect flash reflected from ceiling and walls and try not to overpower the subject.

[Frank Fremerey]

Hi Derek.

Wonderful flower shot.

One question as I did not see this flower in reality: Are the colors exactely the way they were when you shot them?

In my memory, the safran colored lily has some different tones which could be caused by:

1) my memory
2) your lighting
3) your White Balance
4) your post processing / device calibration

I hope my post is not annoying. I wish it to be helpful.

I started to get my workflow color right after being hit by annotations in forums ten years ago.

All the best

Frank

[Jakov Minić]

Derek, I welcome your Lily and congratulate you on your 48th wedding anniversary

[Derek1945]

To Jakov, thank you for your kind words.  To Bjorn, thank you for your suggestions..I will put them to good use. To Frank, I had a look at the flower and realized I had saturated the yellow way to much.  In NX2 I used the black control point on the black back ground which darkened the yellow too much.  I opened up the original Raw file and this time I used the white control point on one of the unopened buds on the top left. This gave me a more accurate yellow to match the flower. I have attached the reworked image. Your post is not annoying it is very helpful.
Thanks to everyone for replying.

[Gary]

I like the second lily much better than the first. Well done.

[Derek1945]

Thank you Gary.

[Erik Lund]

Yes the second one really shines!

[s.smith]

This is exquisite! Absolutely beautiful. Thanks for sharing it.

[rosko]

I perceive a lost of fine details on the second one. Mostly on the buds.

Also, I find, on the second shot, the yellow tunes paler, but the green parts render better.

Delicate and pleasant shot anyway.

[armando_m]

Congrats on your 48th wedding anniversary

I prefer the  colors in the  2nd shot