Are these photos have any potential?

I have composed a leaf in different ways with my Lumix G7. These are raw images from camera which is not post-processed. KIndly give our opinions on the composition and comment the photo which you liked most.

How these photos can be post-processed to a satisfactory one? Share your valuable suggestion

(NB: I am just a beginner in photography)

1. They have been processed, just using some kind of default.
2. You're asking the wrong questions of the wrong people. Ask yourself if you like the pictures enough to do something more with them. You're in the arts part of photography.

IMHO the main problem with these images is the lack of separation of the main subject, the fairly brightly lit frond in the centre of all the images, and the background.  The first image has the least separation because there is a lot of vegetation behind the frond that isn't sufficiently blurred or dark.  The last image has the best separation because there is less in the background, but is still not ideal.

There are several ways to improve the separation.  One is to have greater blurring of the background.  You either need to find a subject that is further away from the background, or you need to reduce the depth of field.  Read up about depth of field and how to control it, You need to shoot at a wider aperture (lower f/ number), but your lens on a small M4/3 sensor isn't really very good at getting short depth of field.  I would probably try something like a 45mm f/1.8 and shoot wide open.

The other way to achieve subject separation is to have a bright subject and a dark background.  The last image gets close to this, but you could do better.  You can either look for a subject that is brightly lit but has a dark background behind it, or you can darken the background in post processing, but that will require some skill.

Ideally you want both, a dark, blurred background, plus not much in the background anyway.

The other problem, for me, is that central frond just isn't interesting enough.  I really nice, brightly coloured flower would be so much better.

There has been a series of threads on the Open Forum recently called "Show us your flowers".  Look through those to find out what you really like.

Let me answer with a question.

It would be useful to know what drew you to this particular subject and what you were trying to convey to those who view the image. For instance, why did you choose this leaf instead of one a few branches down? Was there a particular story you were trying to tell or attribute of this leaf that you found interesting?

Composition is used to help tell a story or emphasize particular attributes of a subject, so it is hard to give advice without understanding your relation to the subject.

With that said, it is totally fine if you don't really have answers to those questions and just liked it. However, I would recommend asking yourself those types of questions if you want your pictures to have broad appeal. I personally think the pictures are quite nice, but I have a hard time relating to them.

You mentioned you are a beginner to photography, and I can say they are much better than my photos when I was a beginner.

There is certainly nothing bad about the photos. Technically they are good. They are in focus.

Artistically, it is clear what you were trying to attempt; you wanted to make that one frond standout.

From a composition perspective if find that either there isn't enough separation between the subject and background (1st image) or too much negative space drawing the eyes away from your subject. If these were mine, I'd try tightening the composition on the 3rd last or last images and see how these come out, and perhaps add some vignette to draw the eyes onto the subject. Any subject has potential.

You were moving in the right direction as you progressed from the first to the last three of the posted images. I see good potential in tho last one, given some post processing.This brings to mind three guidelines provided by the NY School of Photography's website, which I came across when I was starting out. I wrote them on a card and carried it with me. They were:

1. Know your subject.

2. Shoot to emphasize your subject.

3. Shoot to remove distractions from your subject.

That can lead to clean images with eye-catching focus on your intended subject.

You are on the path. Good fortune as you move foward.

It can dramatically change an image/composition.  See what looks best. Try tighter crops, or off centre even change the angle.  Dont worry about the noise etc you may get if you zoom in too much. It will help you learn next time how better to compose and take the source shot.

Once you have a nice crop, then you can try other post processing tricks

I liked the first one the most with the repeating branches in the background.

As others have suggested (this is one of the best thread I have read on suggesting how to improve an image), still life need something more than a nice plant

I got curios how it would turn out if the advices were followed.

I have selectively brightened the main branch and used TOPAZ Sharpen AI to bring out the veins in the leaves. Also cropped to bring more emphasize to the main branch.

Your subject (the frond) is a different tone than the background in most of these photos - light green vs dark. I would therefore convert them to black and white to strip away the inessentials. After B&W conversion, I would increase the contrast slightly, deepen shadows and lighten highlights, which will help the subject stand out.

dark_matter wrote:

I have composed a leaf in different ways with my Lumix G7. These are raw images from camera which is not post-processed. KIndly give our opinions on the composition and comment the photo which you liked most.

How these photos can be post-processed to a satisfactory one? Share your valuable suggestion

(NB: I am just a beginner in photography)

No

Your post and examples show that you are thinking about composition, which is excellent.  You had good advice and examples from Janet and the advice to frame (or crop) to position your subject in a narrative structure is also good.

My impression is that you found the structure of the leaf interesting but couldn’t find a way of capturing that.  If you look, the leaf is all one colour with lighting differences.  Shooting in colour just allows the background to distract from the leaf.  You also have a nice repeat of the leaf pattern behind it but a jarring transition to a jumble around it.

Acting on those observations, do you find the processing above is closer to what you saw?

Andrew

jsaras wrote:

No

Well aren't you a miserable lil' bugger ...