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Anacamptis pyramidalis


Anacamptis pyramidalis
Photo Information
Copyright: Valerie Schnepp (valy67) Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 1409 W: 53 N: 1929] (5768)
Genre: Plants
Medium: Color
Date Taken: 2006-06-11
Categories: Flowers
Camera: Canon 350D, Canon EF 18mm-55mm f/3.5 - f/5.6
Photo Version: Original Version, Workshop
Date Submitted: 2006-06-12 13:25
Viewed: 1093
Points: 44
[Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note
Pyramidal orchid (Anacamptis pyramidalis)

This sunday I walked along the Rhine with some friends. It was a very industrialized area, with factories everywhere. There was also a huge dam, all in beton, something quite ugly but very useful as it produces energy without any greenhouse effect gases. And there, on a small patch of grass between all this beton and metal, I saw this beautiful flower. It was the first time I saw it. It was going down very straight, and the dry grass was very slippery, so at each moment I could have fallen into the Rhine and drown myself ! Wherever I placed myself, there was always an awful BG, no way to avoid it, this is the best one - so forgive me if the BG is not very beautiful :-)

I know this shot is ar from perfect, but I really liked this flower, and I thought it was worth posting, I hope you will like it.

The pyramidal orchid Anacamptis pyramidalis is an orchid native to central and southern Europe.
This hardy perennial grows to a height of 30 cm. The colour of the flower varies from pink to purple, and the scent is described as "foxy". The arrangement of hermaphroditic flowers in a compact pyramidal shape is very distinctive and gives the orchid its common name. The flowers are pollinated by butterflies and moths. This orchid requires a sunny spot on diverse soils :loamy or clay, rarely on sandy soils. It can even grow on very alkaline soil.
The dried and ground tuber gives a fine white powder, called salep. This is a very nutritious sweet starchlike substance. It is used in drinks, cereals and in making bread. It is also used medicinally in diets for children and convalescents.

If you want more info about this flower, you can have a look at this site : http://www.maltawildplants.com/ORCH/Anacamptis_pyramidalis.html

When I posted the picture, I realised it was very noisy in the BG, but it was too late to change it. I posted a better version as a WS, please have a look at it !
loot, sAner, Signal-Womb, lovenature, jeanpaul, jammer79, TAZ, pablominto, eruyanik, dew77, cas_orla, coasties, aido, SkyF, marhowie, thistle, liquidsunshine, jcoowanitwong, nainnain, Alex99 has marked this note useful
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Discussions
ThreadThread Starter Messages Updated
To thistle: Noisy BGvaly67 3 06-16 09:15
To marhowie: Your WSvaly67 1 06-13 12:51
To loot: Hi loot !valy67 1 06-13 09:42
To Aramok: Hi !valy67 1 06-12 15:35
To jmp: Hi !valy67 1 06-12 14:22
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Critiques [Translate]

  • Great 
  • jmp Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 1836 W: 94 N: 2341] (8407)
  • [2006-06-12 14:17]
  • [+]

Hi Valerie,
Yes, a beautiful orchid indeed! And with the PS you got a clean bg. Still studying your new camera?:-)
Best regards,
José M.

what a lovely orchid and such vibrant colours you have recorded there. All of the orchid and the stem is in focus which is what counts. If you could have (I know you couldn't) I would have bent down the grass alongside the orchid to get it out of the picture without affecting or altering the habitat...

I also often find a longer lens better for recording orchids, especially when you are not meant to be where they are!

Great shot, BG would have been fine except for the noise - was ISO were you on?

TFS

Emma

  • Great 
  • sAner Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 1648 W: 79 N: 1438] (4742)
  • [2006-06-12 15:49]

Excellent shot. Very nice colors and sharp focus. I do have the feeling the picture is a wee bit oversharpened as I can see some noise in the bg. POV is great and so is DOF. Well done & TFS!

Regards,
Pieter

Great colour and exposure on this capture Valerie, love the simple frame. Pieter is right about the over-sharpening, there is artifacts clearly seen around the flower. Regards Steve.

Hi Valerie, Your pink orchid is worth posting, it's beautiful and so unique looking. Your colour is vibrant and the detail is great. TFP (thanks for posting) Janice :)

Bonjour Valerie
Ta photo est absolument une superbe. Les couleurs y sont vraiment superbes, et la netteté parfaite. Execellente prise de vue
Bravo et merci...JP

  • Great 
  • loot Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 5779 W: 607 N: 3564] (9623)
  • [2006-06-12 21:13]
  • [2] [+]

Hi Valerie
I am still plagued by the flu, but TN is calling and I could not resist this lovely orchid. It seems your dare-devil antics for getting this shot were pushing your luck a bit, but the result is a great photo and the workshop especially is spot-on.
The vertical frame worked well for this composition, the colours are stunning, and the DOF delivered excellent details all around the inflorescence. The BG is sufficiently OOF to isolate the flower and the exposure was perfect.
Very well done and TFS.
Regards
Loot

PErfect composition!
Eye catching colours.
Like it very much.
REgards, R.

  • Great 
  • TAZ Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 2385 W: 50 N: 3170] (10926)
  • [2006-06-13 1:32]

Une agréable photo, les couleurs sont éclatantes et la luminosité est belle. Peut-être aurait-il fallu gommé les 2 brindilles... Moi je les coupe avant de faire la prise de vue quand je le remarque dans le viseur ;-)
Compliments Valérie.

Hello Valerie,
Super colours..! Well framed flower, good use of lighting and you do well on the macro work!
The noise reduction helps, of course...
Greetings,
Pablo -

Beautiful flower again Valérie! Great colours which is in my favourite on it, and it's shape very nice too. Hey! to me there is no problem on the bg, on the contrary i like this bg a lot. Brown and green mixed parts looks great and the upper side has nice blue cause of the sky! Well seen and wonderfully taken!
Thank you and best regards!
Ersin

  • Great 
  • red45 Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 2841 W: 75 N: 8090] (27431)
  • [2006-06-13 3:13]

Bonjour Valerie!

Orchids are very hard to capture. Every time I take orchid picture it is totally miss :-) Yours looks very nice - I like shape of flower, bright colours, details. Very adequate latin name also. Interesting note completed this very good post!

  • Great 
  • dew77 Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 4964 W: 298 N: 4027] (13131)
  • [2006-06-13 4:55]

Hello Valerie,
Excellent capture.I liked vivid colors,POV,lighting,3D effect
and composition a lot.
TFS...:-)

Hi Valerie

Excellent shot. Lovely shape to the flower head. Excellent saturation of colour, clear, sharp details. Congrats.

  • Great 
  • aido Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 1095 W: 169 N: 1218] (4046)
  • [2006-06-13 7:35]

Hi Valerie,
A beautiful Orchid. Great shot, beautiful colours and although there is direct sunlight the exposure is perfect. DOF is perfect too, the whole flower and stem in focus with a nice defocused background. I think the BG is ok, it's defocused so nothing is really visible and it has some nice light and colour, the blue especially is a good contrast to the Orchid. Interesting note too, great work.
Regards,
Adrian

  • Great 
  • SkyF Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 2390 W: 194 N: 1991] (8113)
  • [2006-06-13 8:00]

Hello Valerie,
not a good idea to fall into the Rhein, never mind drowning, but think of all the yucky stuff that floats in it ;-).
Wonderful flower you found and captured so well. POV,details and sharness are wonderful. TFS..Sky

Nice shot Valerie,
Lovely color and details, nice light.
I did a quick WS, reducing the mid-tone contrast a bit, and added a BG blur.
Well done and TFS!
PS - I did not see your WS before I posted it..they look pretty much the same :)

Hallo Valerie,

I really like this picture. The flower is beautiful. Good focus, DOF and nice composition. Well done.

Jan-Hendrik

Hello Valerie,
Lovely shot! The orchid is really beautiful and I'm glad you took the risk to capture it ;-)
The POV, framing and light are really good. I don't mind BG too because all these patches of different colours make it very interesting. I prefer such BG's than entirelly blurred ones.
As for the noise. It is quite strong even on the eddited images. I saved the picture on my PC and looked at it in zoom. If you do that you will see lots of small squares. So I guess the ISO wasn't a reason here because it would give a noise like grain not the squares. I would rather guess it was some postprocessing mistake. You usually get such look of the picture when you compress jpg files very heavy. Maybe you did it? I wonder if the original also have such noise?
Anyway, it's still a lovely picture!
VERY WELL DONE!

  • Great 
  • mbasil Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 352 W: 148 N: 717] (3146)
  • [2006-06-16 12:54]

This is a beauty Valerie. I like the subject and you've composed a very nice shot. I don't know why you're getting so much noise from your 350D, though. It looks like a farily well-lit shot. My hunch is you let the camera auto select the ISO and it want to 800 or so. So you might want to constrain it to 200 (I always struggle with that with my camera. I like to set it at 200, but then I have to adjust for low light situations. So it never just stays at 200).
Mike

A nice post Valerie,
You've corrected the BG issue with a good workshop.
Good detail, colours and sharpness. exposure and lighting are good. Good POV and composition.

Thanks for posting, enjoy the rest of the week.

Hi Valerie,
Excellent picture. Composition, pov, dof are great. Well controlled on color saturation and contrast. Very well done.
JC

  • Great 
  • Alex99 Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 3245 W: 154 N: 4948] (15933)
  • [2007-12-19 22:09]

Hi Valerie.
Thank you for visit and kind words. Thank you also for this charming picture taken with ultimate taste and skill. Great lights, amazing colours, superb wide DOF and sharpness of the plant, very nice colourful BG. Composition and vertical cropping are so amazing. Bravo and best wishes.
Alexei.

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