TWIP Verbena

I had some flowers come up in the back yard planted a very long time ago.  They never came up prior to this year, so I was pleased to see them.  Flowers bring an ever present opportunity to do a little photography.  I for one, enjoy photographing flowers, but not like most people.  I prefer to focus stack my photos to give the flower the most detail you can get get, while leaving the background a smooth and creamy look.  A very generous Facebook friend provided me with the name of these lovely little flowers,  Verbena.  

I decided to photograph each bloom's color for this blog.  Who knows, maybe I a nice coffee table book may come out of this idea.  Anyway, here are the shots if you haven't seen them already.  I intend to make a nice simple focus stacking tutorial for anyone who is interest.  I'll link it to this post and future focus stacking posts.

  

LAB Color adjustments

Something I forget to examine when working with sunsets and outdoor photos in general, is whether or not LAB effects will bring out anything to make them better.  The last couple of sunsets, I decided to do a little experiment and see if there was something I could do to make them even better.  LAB adjustments can make the photo pop, but the adjustments have to be done tastefully because they can really over saturate your photo if your not careful.  Here is an example of what LAB can do for a photo.  The photos were taken 20 seconds apart with the one of the left being first.  It also is the one I treated with a light touch of LAB.

This technique is done in photoshop by converting the file to LAB color mode.  Find the image tab in the top menu, select mode, then LAB color.  It will flatten your image if you have layers open so beware.  At this point, I like to duplicate my image layer so I can adjust the opacity of it when I have completed the adjustments.  The next step is to open your curves adjustment window.  I don't use the curves adjustment layer since I have used it this way in the past.  Old habits I guess.  Anyway, the first step is to select the "a" channel and move your curves line like shown.

Next step is to move your "b" channel line as shown.  You can see how your image is saturating and changing contrast as you adjust your curves.

The last adjustment is to your "lightness" channel.  Move the adjustments as this.  The top adjustment will bring down the highlights of your photo while the bottom point will lower your contrast.  I like to play with the bottom point a little depending on my view for the photo I am working on.  

Depending on how you like the color and saturation, you can adjust your opacity to taste.  Lastly, you will want to convert your image back to RGB color to make it readable on web and other services.  To do this, go to your image menu on the top, select mode, and RGB color.  This again will flatten your image if you have made any layers.  

That's it!  You have completed your LAB color adjustment for your photo.  Here is another example of what LAB color can do for a sunset.  Click on any of the photos for a large view.

Sunset on the Prairie

I haven't had the chance to get out and take sunset photos in a very long time.  Over Labor Day weekend, we were traveling and saw this amazing sunset happening before our eyes.  Wanting to find a nice location to stop and photograph the sunset was going to be tricky.  Luckily we were in hay country and a lightly traveled dirt road lead us to this location.  The area wasn't far off the road so I had time to pull over before the sun had completely set and the pinks of the sun's rays had not completely dissolved.  Having my main camera packed away for the trip, I pulled out the Canon EOS M and not wanting to fuss too much with the settings, snapped a quick picture for reference.  I then used those settings in Manual Mode and snapped about 33 vertical shots back and forth across the hayfield.  I then used Lightroom to adjust the photos and stitched them in Photoshop.  This first photo is the full 33 shot Panorama.

Seeing as that I took the photos in almost a full 180 degrees, the area in front of me was a tad too bent for my taste.  I had to significantly crop and attempt to straighten it as best I could.  So I decided to cut the stitched file down to 17 shots.  This dramatically straightened the flowers in the ditch and made the photo much more appealing.

For a more full resolution look at these photos, you can click on the photo itself to be taken to my website where they can be viewed as wide as your monitor will allow.  Another location you could see them at their full resolution would be on my 500px account.  You can also see other photos that I am particularly proud of on that site also.  If you have a 500px account, please follow me and I will do the same.  I always enjoy viewing other work!