ISO 100 50mm 0ev f/2.8 1/125
This coneflower has had my attention for the last few days. Today I decided to shoot it in black and white. Actually the original image is in color. I used my Canon 50D with a 50mm lens to get this shot. I also used my tripod. There was a slight breeze, so I thought the tripod would help with any movement. When taking a picture like this I am often thinking about depth of field. What should be in focus and what would I like to see blurred. I settled on an f-stop of 2.8 because I decided I liked the petals in focus but not the stem. I tried f/1.8 but the petals were to out of focus for my liking. At f/7.1 the stem and some of the ground were in focus which ended up not being a very pretty picture.
I edited this photo in Photoshop. I converted it to black and white using a red filter setting. In addition to cropping, I also changed the contrast.
From there, I cropped it a bit differently to create a 5×7 card to put on my website.
This post was written in response to a black and white photo challenge that is hosted by Sonel, and I would like to thank her for the inspiration for creating this photo.
Thoughts? Comments? feel free to leave them below.
Cheers!
Photography Journal Blog 
B&W pics have some much depth, I don’t know why?
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I agree that they do. I wonder sometimes if it is because you look at them in a more focused way. Color photos sometimes seem easier to look at, if that makes sense…
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Yep I think that’s it, exactly.
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🙂
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Absolutely stunning PJB! I love what you’ve done with the coneflower. Thanks so much for taking part. This is a great entry for the challenge. 😀 *hugs*
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Thank you, I really appreciated the challenge this week 🙂
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Glad to hear that. 😀
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🙂
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I like it. I am surprised that half the petals have already fallen.
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Thanks. Part of the reason that the petals have fallen is that we had some severe rain and localized flooding this week. That flower is pretty exposed, so it took a bit of a pounding.
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Striking image, a great candidate for black and white..simple components, nicely composed!
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Thanks 🙂 I think it is often the case that simple components make for nice black and white images.
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I reaaly like the way your described you echnique and what it took to get to your final results.
It is quite fabulous.
Isadora
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Thank you very much 🙂
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Beautiful composition in b+w. Thanks for describing your thought process and technique.
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Thank you 🙂 I find writing down what I have done useful for later reference.
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So glad yo have you join us in this challenge. We are gonna have fun with this one! Great first post. I’m excited already for next week. In case you don’t know I have been told the next theme is “Neighborhood”. Ready, set, shoot!
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Yeah, I don’t shoot a lot of black and white, so I figure this challenge will stretch me a bit. I did see that neighborhood is up for next week. I have no idea what I am going to do for that…
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I’ve been playing today too. I’ll get there! 🙂
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Sounds good 🙂 Feel free to leave a link to your image in these comments if you would like.
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What an interesting post. I love reading how people process their images.
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Thank you, and I have to say I enjoy reading through how other people process their work as well.
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Lovely PJB and not a ‘perfect ‘ coneflower as it were with complete petals etc . Works really well in B&W. Thanks for all the camera settings info too !
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Thank you, this flower took a beating this week when we had some stormy weather. I did like the B&W version better than the color that I had.
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I love this. There’s something so poignant about the missing petals combined with your choice to shoot it in black and white. Great work!
Blessings to you!
Patricia
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Thank you, I do think it made a much stronger image in black and white instead of color.
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I really liked the simplicity of this composition – Good stuff 🙂
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Thank you, I really thought the black and white helped too, the color version was just a bit too busy.
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Really nice! I like the photo & processing, but even before that, I like the fact that you chose to photograph a “half-gone” flower.
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Thanks, this one was damaged in a storm we had but I really thought it was beautiful that way.
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