Photographic Study of Queen Anne's Lace in One Photo Revision

This past week or two, up through tonight, I've been working on trying to improve several of the photographs I took while on vacation.  Honestly, I've only ever been on two vacations in my entire life and both were treats given to me by my daughter.  So it is important to me that the photos I shot while there are the best they can be.  I'm also working on other photos I'm trying to improve.  This post will be about just one photo and what has been done to make it better.  It's a photo of Queen Anne's Lace--a weed--but one that is pretty enough to deserve a royal name.

Before I get to the photos, I thought it would be interesting to find out some facts about this wild plant.  For instance, did you know that it is also called a wild carrot and the roots are edible if pulled early enough before they get woody.  Great care must be taken, however, because the plant is very close in appearance to several poisonous species such as Hemlock. 

"Queen Anne’s lace earned its common name from a legend that tells of Queen Anne of England (1665-1714) pricking her finger and a drop of blood landed on white lace she was sewing. Belonging to the carrot family, Queen Anne’s lace is a biennial that is also known as wild carrot. Early Europeans cultivated Queen Anne’s lace, and the Romans ate it as a vegetable. American colonists boiled the taproots, sometimes in wine as a treat. Interestingly, Queen Anne’s lace is high in sugar (second only to the beet among root vegetables) and sometimes it was used among the Irish, Hindus and Jews to sweeten puddings and other foods." See more here.
Here is another website about this interesting plant.. 





Okay, let's get to the photos.

 This is the original photo pretty much right out of the camera.  I may have done some sharp focus editing on the day I photographed this.  It was about a year ago, taken in a store front alley near an interesting spot many photographers use for both wedding and family group portraits.  While my daughter-in-law was photographing some of her children there, I was looking around for other things to photograph.  I noticed among the tossed out pop and beer cans, empty snack packages and other bits of trash, these flowering weeds attempting to give the alley some beauty.  I wanted to see if I could take some of that away with me.  Because it was a hot day and I don't walk as well as I would like to, I was actually sitting in the car with the door open when I took this shot.  Since this was last year, I was also still pretty new to the camera I was using, and still use.  It is a Canon Rebel EOS T3i with the kit 18-55mm lens.  The photo was shot at 1/125 sec, f7.1, and ISO 100.

I asked for some assistance at an online photography forum I am a member of called The Shark Tank on Light Stalking. While I originally felt that it was focused okay, if maybe a little soft, it was suggested that the main subject was flat and needed to be sharper.  I was initially concerned that if I had sharpened it already when I first took the photo, sharpening it more would create too much digital noise.  So I resisted that suggestion but chose, instead to try to enhance the overall shot by using a "warm" filter in editing.  Here is that result.

Well, while it did make the background much better, it is still showing as being too soft or out of focus.  So I gave in and decided to try to sharpen it again.  Here is that result.

I did have to admit that this made the photo better.  The sharpened photo looked more in focus, although there are a few petals near the center that are still out of focus.  But there was still that initial issue about the photo looking flat and the eyes being drawn away from the main flower to those in the background.  So this time I decided to try black and white.  I tried two different styles of black and white.  The first one below is what is considered normal black and white.

Now I have been looking at this photo long enough and working with it long enough that my eye is naturally drawn to the background just to check how it looks overall.  So I am not able to adequately judge whether I have accomplished the goal of keeping the eyes on the main flower.  Below is what is called "heavy" black and white.

I had to remove digital noise from both of the black and white photos as it was very noticeable in both of those.  Also I notice in the bottom one, the heavy black and white, that there is more dark tones to the flower itself than in the normal black and white.  I think the heavy shadowing in the bottom one brings more attention to the background instead of moving the attention to the main flower, while the normal black and white one keeps the focus on the main flower where it belongs. What do you think?  Please feel free to comment about your suggestions and tips.

While I am at it, below are some graphic designs, or digital fusion photographic art that I did with this particular photo of Queen Anne's Lace.  I hope you like them.  For more of the things I am working on, don't forget to follow me on Flickr and on Twitter @capirani.

Queen Anne’s lace earned its common name from a legend that tells of Queen Anne of England (1665-1714) pricking her finger and a drop of blood landed on white lace she was sewing. Belonging to the carrot family, Queen Anne’s lace is a biennial that is also known as wild carrot. Early Europeans cultivated Queen Anne’s lace, and the Romans ate it as a vegetable. American colonists boiled the taproots, sometimes in wine as a treat. Interestingly, Queen Anne’s lace is high in sugar (second only to the beet among root vegetables) and sometimes it was used among the Irish, Hindus and Jews to sweeten puddings and other foods. - See more at: http://www.ediblewildfood.com/queen-annes-lace.aspx#sthash.QuBqme2I.dpuf

Queen Anne’s lace earned its common name from a legend that tells of Queen Anne of England (1665-1714) pricking her finger and a drop of blood landed on white lace she was sewing. Belonging to the carrot family, Queen Anne’s lace is a biennial that is also known as wild carrot. Early Europeans cultivated Queen Anne’s lace, and the Romans ate it as a vegetable. American colonists boiled the taproots, sometimes in wine as a treat. Interestingly, Queen Anne’s lace is high in sugar (second only to the beet among root vegetables) and sometimes it was used among the Irish, Hindus and Jews to sweeten puddings and other foods. - See more at: http://www.ediblewildfood.com/queen-annes-lace.aspx#sthash.QuBqme2I.dpuf

Queen Anne’s lace earned its common name from a legend that tells of Queen Anne of England (1665-1714) pricking her finger and a drop of blood landed on white lace she was sewing. Belonging to the carrot family, Queen Anne’s lace is a biennial that is also known as wild carrot. Early Europeans cultivated Queen Anne’s lace, and the Romans ate it as a vegetable. American colonists boiled the taproots, sometimes in wine as a treat. Interestingly, Queen Anne’s lace is high in sugar (second only to the beet among root vegetables) and sometimes it was used among the Irish, Hindus and Jews to sweeten puddings and other foods. - See more at: http://www.ediblewildfood.com/queen-annes-lace.aspx#sthash.QuBqme2I.dpuf

Queen Anne’s lace earned its common name from a legend that tells of Queen Anne of England (1665-1714) pricking her finger and a drop of blood landed on white lace she was sewing. Belonging to the carrot family, Queen Anne’s lace is a biennial that is also known as wild carrot. Early Europeans cultivated Queen Anne’s lace, and the Romans ate it as a vegetable. American colonists boiled the taproots, sometimes in wine as a treat. Interestingly, Queen Anne’s lace is high in sugar (second only to the beet among root vegetables) and sometimes it was used among the Irish, Hindus and Jews to sweeten puddings and other foods. - See more at: http://www.ediblewildfood.com/queen-annes-lace.aspx#sthash.QuBqme2I.dpuf