My wife, Darcy, and I were walking by some type of palm tree (I think it was a palm tree!). It was the early evening and the sun was casting a really cool shadow threw the palm leaves. I thought it might make for an interesting shot. When I brought it into Photoshop I dodged her eyes to bring out the green color. After that I decided to mess with the hue/saturation. When I dropped the yellow levels, the very bright green leaves turned grey! I also applied USM and gaussian blur to smooth out some of the imperfections. I thought the adjustments gave a very surreal effect. We'll see how it does in the competition.
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I think this would have worked better had you left the leaves green. I like what you're going for but I think her eyes are green and maybe the leaf color would have been a nice compliment.
The desaturation of the leaves makes this image look oddly artificial. Bouncing more light onto the model's face would have helped keep both the shadows and highlights on her face properly exposed.
I would need to see the original to confirm, but I think I would prefer the leaves not having been desaturated. the light on the face is a little strong.
i do not care for the selective desat in this photo. I believe a rich green leaf would be much more dinamic.
The only "D" here is in the title, and we must take your word for it that the model actually is called darcy.
Good capture and I love the selective desat. The name "Darcy and Leaves" is not an obvious D&L if the viewer does not know the name of the model though
Interesting take on portraiture, nice model who seems comfortable with posing, good focus and depth of field. Although generally I have nothing against selective desaturation, in this case I do not think that it's a wise visual design choice, as it creates a rather heavy imbalance. Additionally, the strong and directional light not only causes problems with exposure (i.e. blown highlights), but also creates those not-so-attractive strips of shadows on the model's face. I'd try to get this shot under more diffuse lighting and also go with a straight-on and tight composition.
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