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Water: Basic Element of Life
Water: Basic Element of Life
Sting11165


Photograph Information Photographer's Comments
Challenge: The Four Elements II (Advanced Editing V)
Camera: Canon EOS-350D Rebel XT
Location: my garden
Date: May 26, 2007
Aperture: f/8
ISO: 400
Shutter: 1/100s
Galleries: Macro, Water
Date Uploaded: May 26, 2007

 Yup, that's real water.

On a broccoli plant. The other day I noticed how the water was beading up on my broccolis when I watered them, so I got the (unoriginal, overdone) idea to shoot a water drop on a broccoli leaf. Only when I looked at the shots on the computer did I realize it was the texture of the leaves that makes the water bead up.

Thank goodness for advanced editing. It really let me do a lot to this shot:

RSE: RAW conversion (levels, noise, curves, color, etc)
PSP XI: (16-bit tiff)
Extracted water drop on separate layer
Independently adjusted color balance to make the drop stand out and add more green.
Cloned out a bunch of spider threads and secondary drops
Curves and saturation at many different times
Resize
Sharpening, including localized sharpening of merged image

Predict: 6.2 (simply because it is a pretty clean shot, but the texture to the leaf might confuse some people)

Taken with reversed Nikkor-H 50mm f/2.

Statistics
Place: 53 out of 394
Avg (all users): 6.2378
Avg (commenters): 7.7273
Avg (participants): 6.0097
Avg (non-participants): 6.6230
Views since voting: 1078
Views during voting: 273
Votes: 164
Comments: 15
Favorites: 1 (view)

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AuthorThread
 Comments Made During the Challenge
06/03/2007 11:42:10 PM
Nice texture in the leaf, and the drop looks nice and sharp.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 06/03/2007 01:02:48 AM
Exquisite!! This is a perfect picture. Focus is dead on, and the alignment is great.I love all of the intricateness of the leaf's grain. Excellent photo!!
(9)
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/30/2007 11:37:34 PM
Awesome shot!
 05/30/2007 10:22:27 PM
amazing
 05/30/2007 07:01:55 PM
Nice textures, with the leaf texture mirrored in the water. I would frame the leaf fully and crop the dark areas on the left. The image seems off-center.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/30/2007 03:04:29 PM
Very nice...
 05/30/2007 02:51:50 PM
Fabulous - in a challenge where there are several of these, you managed to create an image that stands out...
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/30/2007 02:35:49 PM
i like nice shot
 05/30/2007 02:32:54 PM
The texture of the leaf alone makes this an extremely interesting photograph, but the perfect placement of the droplet just totally tops this off. Great job!
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/29/2007 01:07:37 PM
How delightful! I wish you'd cloned out that distracting leaf edge (or whatever it is) at the upper left corner. Still super thought.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/29/2007 02:21:51 AM
A lovely calm capture:)
 05/28/2007 10:45:05 PM
wow
 05/28/2007 09:59:43 PM
beautiful image, well done.
 05/28/2007 05:29:33 PM
Nice round drop and great sharpness
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 05/28/2007 05:17:40 AM
a tad oversharpened, otherwise well done
  Photographer found comment helpful.


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