C+C on large Echinacea please

[dylanstraub]

i

My concerns with this image are: the lines in the background (distracting or appealing) and did I over edit the center of the flower. Most shots of this flower on Flickr either show a very gaudy (or out of focus) or tack sharp (and way too intense) cone. I decided to shoot this from a different angle and enhance (sharpen?) the cone while making minimal edits on the rest of the shot. Any thoughts on this? Editing was done with Photoshop (raw) and Nik Viveza. Thanks for looking and your critique.

BTW the thumbnail doesn't look like much so click on the link (pic) for a better view.

 

[dxqcanada]

You are right about the background.
Sometimes sharpness is not always the best thing.

If you want to continue with this subject ... try a different viewpoint.
Try shallow DoF.
Try under exposing.
Experiment ... cause honestly, it is not the strongest subject by itself.

 

[dylanstraub]

You are right about the shallow DOF. I was chasing the damn butterflies and had my camera on shutter priority instead of aperture which is why I ended up with a F10 instead of my usual F2.8 etc. I wanted to show the texture of the flower so I sharpened the middle but everything else was not changed. Thanks for your feedback.