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Yellow/Green Mushroom

Gallery: Macro & Close-upPosted December 22, 201445 views7 comments

After all the rain we've had in the past 2 weeks, I was beginning to see mushrooms. So today, I took the big lens off the camera and put on a smaller zoom and headed up to the preserve to see what I could find. There were lots of mushrooms. Many were not particularly attractive, but I liked this yellow/green one as I thought the color was a bit unusual for a mushroom. I also liked the BG of old leaves and grass along with the new growth of grass. I thought the flat plate like top of the mushroom was also unusual. It reminded me of a bird bath. To make this more attractive for posting, I cropped it some. Top, bottom, and both sides. This was shot as a vertical so the cropping was that horrendous. This is about 60% of the original. I also wanted to move it out of dead center. So this is more to the URC. Good move or not? Other than that I warmed the temp a little, added some contrast, opened up the blacks and shadows a little, then added some clarity and vibrance. Okay? Your comments and critiques are welcome.

Tech Info

Canon EOS 60D with EF 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 at 135mm
1/80th at f/8 and ISO 250
handheld
Lightroom 5

Comments

7 comments

Comment posted by Alberto Patiño on December 22, 2014 at 12:56 AM

Peter, it looks to me as if the light conditions were not optimal. I think that the composition is fine if you want to show the mushrooms top, I would have used a lower point of view, but that is just a matter of taste. My other comment would be that I would have tried to get a shallower depth of field, even if that meant getting part of the mushroom (the stalk?) out of focus. Ad it is I think that it blends too much with the background. On another topic, glad to hear that it has rained enough for mushrooms to sprout !!!!

Registered on December 2, 2014, 278 Posts, 1736 Comments

Comment posted by scott lanz on December 22, 2014 at 7:06 AM

I like the off center comp, Peter. I see this was done pp, and I think it was a good decision. Much better than centering the subject, IMO. I also like the subject to bg ratio in the final crop. I think Alberto makes some good suggestions, but I also think the mushroom stands out well from the bg as is due to its contrasting lighter color. The final result is excellent and gives you a good idea of what to capture in camera the next time you go hunting mushrooms.

Registered on November 14, 2003, 840 Posts, 12902 Comments

Comment posted by Patricia Brundage on December 22, 2014 at 7:44 AM

Because the background is in sharp focus I would crop it even more from the top to give the mushroom more importance. If you're into photoshop you could outline the mushroom, invert, and then blur the background some.

Registered on March 23, 2006, 1111 Posts, 6531 Comments

Comment posted by Nancy Lea Sandy on December 24, 2014 at 2:19 PM

The off-center crop works nicely. A tighter dof might have seperated it from the bg a bit more but an interesting shot as is.

Registered on January 24, 2011, 576 Posts, 6942 Comments

Comment posted by Richard Teller on December 25, 2014 at 9:44 PM

The mushroom is sharp and the color good, but I think the image is to busy. The Mushroom doesn't grab the attention like it should.

Registered on August 23, 2010, 1162 Posts, 6692 Comments

Comment posted by Yun Gao on December 26, 2014 at 2:28 PM

I like your crop/composition and editing. The mushroom is lovely. The background is busy, a slight Gaussian blur in the background might help. I prefer this image to your next post, because it is simple.

Registered on September 11, 2012, 267 Posts, 1621 Comments

Comment posted by Mark Seaver on December 26, 2014 at 7:30 PM

I agree that the yellow/green combo in this 'shroom is very attractive. It also stands out well against the leaves and grass on the forest floor. In this look, I would have moved that one blade of grass that either bends or ends at about 10:30 on the mushroom head. As with your later post, I think your processing looks very good, with very natural colors. If your going to shot a lot of things this small, you'll quickly find that you need a true macro lens (on that goes to 1:1 or 1:2). While a lot of zooms claim macro capabilities, if you look, you'll probably find that yours is limited to 1:4 or 1:5, which just isn't enough to fill the frame with something as small as this mushroom (which I'm guessing is around 2 - 3 inches tall).

Registered on January 23, 2011, 1103 Posts, 17270 Comments