Flowering Cholla, C&C

[Tkot]

I always find it really eye opening when the Cholla bloom. What a reminder that even in the most ugly, prickly things that everyone hates, you can still find great beauty.

Anyways, here are some photos I took of the aforementioned blossoms. Yeah yeah, more flower photography, been there, done that, I know, I know.

#1

#2

#3

 

[WesternGuy]

These look very nice - nice bokeh in the last one :thumbup:. Being from the Great White North, these are flowers I will never see north of 49 - maybe I need to journey down to New Mexico, wait, I just remembered I will be coming in October for the Albuguerque hot air balloon festival, but then these will be gone, but maybe there are lots of other things to photograph after the festival is over, because I intend to stay for a few days. Only nit for me...I would crop the cactus needles (if that is what they are) on the right part of the first image as they tend to take your eye away from the flower which is the point of interest.

I am also curious about whether or not these were shot in raw and what type of post-processing was done, as the second one looks a little oversaturated, but maybe that is just my monitor.

Cheers,

WesternGuy

 

[Tkot]

Thanks Western! Yeah these things have a weird flowering pattern, but rest assured there are plenty of things to photograph down here; the balloons, Ship Rock, Chaco Canyon, Bandeleir Nat. Monument...... If any of it's left after the fire season, we're getting burned up this year. However, the fire damage in itself would be a cool subject too!

Good call on the cropping, didn't notice that at first. These were actually shot in jpeg, and the only post processing I did was to hit the "enhance" button in iPhoto, as I have absolutely zero photoshop skills.

Thanks again for the reply!