Help with PP this Photo!

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Lilbear

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So I find im struggling a bit with PP. Anyway, I don't seem to get it right, or maybe I do and im just too confused to see it lol
I got this photo here, that's the original (resized the file a bit)
Flower Raw by Nati81, on Flickr

That's my PP photo in LR and I sharpened this Insect there a bit in Photoshop but it just doesn't scream wow at me when I look at the photo
Flower-processed by Nati81, on Flickr

And here I applied a matte filter and thought it looks not too bad, but im not sure
Flower by Nati81, on Flickr

So, if anyone has got some spare time and thinks my edits could be better and could PP this photo for me and tell me how they did it, that would be great :D
 
You could try darkening the background to make the main subject stand out - try the shadows slider in LR or PS RAW
 
Lilbear said:
That's my PP photo in LR and I sharpened this Insect there a bit in Photoshop but it just doesn't scream wow at me when I look at the photo
Click to expand...

There's not really anything in PP you're doing wrong. It's just not a "wow" image to begin with.

Images have "wow" because they're great images to begin with. Great images are not created in post processing.
 
I will try darkening the background ands see how that's going to look like, thanks.

Its maybe just an average picture but what I meant is that with PP I could have made the subject stand out more and make it look nicer :)
 
The first thing I would do is use curves to bring back the whites if you are taking it straight into PS as a jpg. I had a quick play and ended up with a lot of adjustment layers as I experimented, as David says, an image that has some "wow" to start with always helps. It is always a great photographic challenge to get a bee on an image and in focus but they don't usually make for great images, a big bumble bee or butterfly are preferable or even just a really in focus flower. I found it an interesting exercise and had curves, selective colour, colour balance layers, Instead of sharpening this I would go the other way and soften and mute it.

View attachment 18441
 
Sorry.. still a bee on a flower with pretty boring lighting no matter what you do with it... it's just purple and blue now.

Lilbear said:
I will try darkening the background ands see how that's going to look like, thanks.

Its maybe just an average picture but what I meant is that with PP I could have made the subject stand out more and make it look nicer :)
Click to expand...


Better lighting would have done that. If it was backlit by low evening sun, then it would have had quite some impact.


You said it yourself... it's an average picture, and it will remain so regardless of processing. Start thinking about light more. Great photographs need great lighting.

I just googled "bee" and "flower" and found over 24 million images not entirely dissimilar to yours! However... SOME stood out head and shoulders above the rest, and it wasn't processing that did it.


This isn't a brilliant shot either, but at least the lighting is picking the subject out nicely. Beautiful light here... it makes a huge difference.

Great use of colour and composition

Great use of focal length and depth of field

As above, but fabulous use of complimentary colours


If you feel the shot is average, why waste time processing it? Learn from it instead... work out why you think it's average, and get back out there with the intention of NOT taking an average shot. That's going to take photographic skill... not processing.
 
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I see what u mean ... though my shot might not win any competitions I don't think it is that bad so I thought I would play about in LR to see what I could do with it to make the flower and the bee standout a bit more.
 
Hopefully you've realised that's not the answer though... fingers crossed.


...and no, it's not terrible... just average.
 
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