Hollyhocks for C&C.

Ron Evers · Jul 13, 2009

Seeds came from a white flowering plant & we have both white & two shades of pink so far.

Pics taken with the S5.

1.

2.

Samanax · Jul 13, 2009

The first image seems right at the verge of becoming oversharpened.

The PP work looks overdone in the second image. Too much sharpening is causing some haloing. Almost looks like an IR image.

Alley Cat Images · Jul 13, 2009

Love the composition in #2.

Ron Evers · Jul 14, 2009

Thanks for your responses Guys.

Samanax, I attributed the look in #2 to the back lighting but your comment made me turn to some other S5 users for an opinion. Here is a response from one of them who is always very thorough.

"So, as to the sharpening, to be honest, I don't know. I'll tell you what I see and think. Looking at the main flower, the central part of it (stamen or whatever it is called) looks very nicely clear and well-defined. As to the petal texture, I can't make my mind up about this. They do have a very crinkled look where the long lines run across them, and a rough/bumpy look towards the near edge of the closest two petals. In part it depends on what the petals actually looked like - some petals do have quite a lot of texture, which as it happens I like to see, but I know some folk do prefer their petals softer and smoother looking. These thoughts are after looking at it rather carefully - it certainly didn't jump out at me as "oh dear, oversharpened" when I originally looked at it.

Another thing I'm not sure about is the edge of the leaves. I suspect they have fine hairs on them and are backlit, so they are probably fine, but there might be an element of sharpening halo mixed in there. I really can't tell. It is similar with the edges of the petals. I see a brighter white around some of the petal edges, and blue edging from about 6 o'clock to 8 o'clock on the petals of the main flower. However, petal edges can have quite different colours from the rest of the petal, and blue would (I think, maybe, not really sure) be a strange colour to have as an artefact), and as to the whiter white on some of the petal edges, this might arise from the petals having a slight curve on their edges and the light hitting them at a different angle. But maybe some of that extra-white is sharpening halos, for example in the 9 to 10 o'clock region of the main flower. Don't know. My guess is that the original will show a bit of extra brightness on the edges, which has been enhanced by the sharpening. And if so, is it too much? A taste issue I suppose. It didn't leap out at me when I first looked at the image. I would be interested to see what other folk think about that.

And the part I often find difficult with regards to sharpening is the hairs on the stems. The effect on them is often what makes me pull back on the sharpening, when they seem to become overly "dominating" and "rough/unrealistic" looking. Have to say though that in this case they simply look back-lit to me.

Lastly (honest

) the leaf to the left of the main flower (at about 10/11 o'clock on the main flower). I'm not 100% sure about the geometry here, but I imagine the surface we are looking at is in the shade. If that is the case, then it does have several small dots which look rather bright to my eye, as do (to a lesser extent) some of the thinnest of the veins. These could be the effects of sharpening.

(A little aside before finishing. I wouldn't be surprised, because it has happened before, that you show us the original and what I've been talking about is all pretty much there in the original - which is one of the reasons why I'm hedging my bets quite a lot.

)

So, the brightnesses on that leaf, and the extra-white (and possibly also the blue-looking) leaf edges are what would raise most questions in my mind about possible sharpening issues, although even with these I'm not that convinced (or visually bothered). The petal textures and stem hairs don't really bother me at all, although they might be too much for some folk. __________________
Nick"