I just want to feeeel...

[benedium]

Shot this butterfly on one of my house plants with a 50mm lens.
Not near enough so had to crop a lot to fill frame with main subject, hence the grainy look.
Played around with curves in Nikon Capture until it went crazy and turned a different colour.

Comments?

[benedium]

So lousy that nobody wanna comment ah?

[bluroom]

Dude. Its psychedelic! I love it. Its freaking brilliant! Its pop art meets nature photography!

[benedium]

Hehe... Thanks for the comment. You are too kind.
Anyway, my ad agency art director says my psychedelic one is manipulated in a bad way.
He says prefers my original image...
which is this one...

So which is better? Original or Psychedelic?

[Patryk]

psychedelic mannn~~~ haha, the original rendition is just way too plain... with all the post processing with the final rendition, i find it more suitable for maybe magazines or poster publications..

[benedium]

Wah! So good meh?
Ok lah... Thanks for the encouraging comment!
Any more critical comments?

[djork]

i think it's good. but why did ur art director say it's bad?

[bluroom]

Still the crazy one man. Write a nice copy and send it to CCA.

[benedium]

I think designers tend to expect more from efforts made to touch up photographs.

[adelynn88]

Of course the psychedelic one! The original image looks flat and the lighting conditions are not favourable. Everyone have their own preference. But in this case your art director really should start school all over again.

[benandfaith]

One more vote for the psychedelic one from me as well. Have you tried doing it in mono? Either B&W or sepia or something like that?

btw, thanks for dropping by and posting in my first post!

[Horus]

Nice! first thought when I saw the butterfly...i thought the feelers were legs and there was some pixie / butterfly girl touching the flower!

[rokieto]

not to discourage or anything, I think your art director has his point.....

the processed one look more like broccoli stems & the overall picture is kind of unbalanced in directing the veiwer's attention, butterfly is almost bleached, maybe the contrast to make the top more saturated to balance with the stock of botak broccoli.
just my 2cts...

[Ed.CJ]

Psychedelic is definitely better than the original..
but.. your butterfly seem to have melted away with the light..

[bluroom]

Interesting comments. I actually think now that the highlights could burn out some more. Go tot he extreme. It could look really dreamy and surreal which could be interesting. The saturation of the flower could be bumped up too ....actually as well as the stalk too. Add another texture filter over the image, maybe explore making it look like a polaroid tear out.

[benedium]

Wow! Thanks for all the super useful comments and tips.
I guess you guys are right. I may be able to improve the picture by separately increasing contrast and saturation for the top part of the picture or reducing the contrast and saturation for the bottom part of the picture. Looks like I have to resort to Photoshop liao... very weak in Photoshop. Scared...

[bluroom]

Why scared man? Always make sure you do a duplicate layer and work from there. So anything wrong, neen scared. I suppose you have a visualiser or FA artist in-house yes? Can get their help too. Or the Art Director that made the comment. Heh heh. In anycase, photoshopping translate to endless fun! Have fun mate. I'm sure we'll all be real keen to see the final result!

[Ed.CJ]

Originally Posted by benedium Wow! Thanks for all the super useful comments and tips. I guess you guys are right. I may be able to improve the picture by separately increasing contrast and saturation for the top part of the picture or reducing the contrast and saturation for the bottom part of the picture. Looks like I have to resort to Photoshop liao... very weak in Photoshop. Scared...

haha. why scared? practice makes perfect.

[eikin]

i like the calmness of the original, the processed one is very much 'effect for effect sake'