Zinnia Bouquet CU - from GSO Farmer's Curb Market

This should have been posted Thurs.  8/20/2015.  When I was at the Farmer's Curb Market last Saturday I bought a bouquet of zinnias because I liked all the different colors in the bouquet.  I did not have time to really take the image until several days later.  I put a green cloth down for the background and then shot from the top down to show as many of the colors and varieties. This was outdoor lighting in the shade.  Camera+ HDR.  Postprocessing with PSE.  I did use paintbucket to make the background better as cloth had wrinkles. Cropped, increased highlights, midtones, sharpened.  

Anniversary Tuberosa Bouquet and CU blossoms

This should have been posted 8/17/2015  Yesterday was our 52nd wddding anniversary.  On Sat. I went to the Farmer's Market to buy a bouquet.  These images are of Tuberosa.  They bloom in August and are very fragrant. Too bad you can not attach smell to a digital photograph.   Native camera app.  for the left image. I know I cropped the top of the left image too short but I could not really spend the time I needed.  This image shows that the buds were not open and for some reason they did not open up as I had anticipated. So I could take more images.  I used my kitchen window lighting and the black background is the side of my refrigerator.  The image on the right I used outdoor lighting.  Camera+  Macro mode.  Post processing  PSE 11.

For more information:  The tuberose (Polianthes tuberosa) is a perennial plant related to the agaves, extracts of which are used as a note in perfumery. The common name derives from the Latin tuberosa, meaning swollen or tuberous in reference to its root system. Polianthes means "many flowers" in Greek. In Mexican Spanish, the flower is called nardo or vara de San José, en.wikipedia.org

Sunflowers from Yanceyville Farmer's Curb Market 7/11/2015

On Saturday morning I went to the Yanceyville Farmer's Curb Market to buy some sunflowers. The area I found them last summer, the farmer had not planted any this year.  I found a vendor that had different varieties and they were the smaller ones that did not droop.  I selected about 9 stems and some were duplicate colors.  Later in the day I tried different lighting situations and backdrops with the iPhone. The one I am posting today was a dark green background, used window lighting but there was not much outdoor light.  So, I decided to useon camera flash.   I tried to arrange these so that some of each sunflower was showing.  I did not have a vase tall enough for the flowers.  I used a paper towel roll and cut it shorter to look like a vase. I cropped to a square, increased the midtones and shadows, sharpened in PSE.   I still want to try to find a field of sunflowers that might be planted along the state highways by the NC DOT.