"Good Morning Sunshine"

"Good Morning Sunshine"
© David A. Ziser

I’m a big fan of sunflowers at least photographically speaking.  Their  bright yellow color, the big fields of bright repeating color, the detail of each blossom is just a kick to photograph.  On our return home a few weeks ago from a family function, LaDawn spotted this magnificent field of sunflowers.  I made the U-turn and minutes later I was shooting away.

I think I covered that sunflower field from about every angle but with more time on my hands I know I could have stayed another hour.  Anyway, this is one of the last exposures I made on that day – I love it!

I positioned the center of the sunflower in the bottom left hand corner of the composition letting the petals fall into it from right to left.  I think it’s the beautifully back-lit yellow petals that add the dynamic feeling and richness to this image. 

The range of yellows helped by the petals heavy backlighting also makes this image work splashing mostly one intense color across the entire image area.  I wanted a little contrast to the image so I tweaked the really dark tones making them even darker so as to really contrast with the rest of the colors of the sunflower.

This image required very little enhancements and looks nearly exactly as it came out of the camera. I added a little tweak of color and contrast here and there, just slightly cleaned up the background and I had my finished presentation.

Camera specs: Canon 7D fitted with 18-200mm IS lens at 200mm, F18 @ 1/80 second, ISO 200.  Enjoy!  -David