Starry Flower
Just playing with Topaz Star Effects
Just playing with Topaz Star Effects
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Dec, 2016Views
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Behind The Lens
Location
I saw these flowers growing in the nursery and thought they would be great for taking photos, so I bought a plant. I picked a flower and bought it inside where I have a workbench with a black velvet backgroundTime
About 4.30pmLighting
Two standard deck lamps and two floor lamps all with flouro bulbs. I can rearrange then to get the right balance of light. They are much cheaper than strobes and with the continuous light you can see the effects while you adjust the positions - they are great for desktop work. You do have to work with slower shutter speeds so the object and the camera need to be held solidly.Equipment
This was shot with a Sony A6000 and Ziess 16-70mm lens, ISO 100, F/8 1/8 sec mounted on a tripod. Aperture priority, centre weighted metering, manual focus - 2 sec delay.Inspiration
Just the star shape of the flower made me think of adding stars to the tips of the petals to give it more impact.Editing
The shot is all about post processing :-) I masked the flower using Topaz remask and sharpened it a bit with Topaz Detail. I then added a blue background layer with a slight graduation. I then added a black layer on top of the flower, reduced the opacity so I could see the flower, then added a 5 pixel white dot at the tip of each petal. Retruned to 100% opacity and opened in Topaz Star Effects. Stars were adjust until I was happy with the effect. I then applied Lighten blending mode to the black layer to remove the black and just leave the stars.In my camera bag
I have traded in all my heavy Pentax gear and how have only a Sony A6000, Ziess 16-70 f/4 and a Sony FE 70-300 G 4.5-5.6. I also carry, but seldom use a Meike MK320 flash. 5 spare batteries (as the A6000 only does about 250 shots per battery), and it all fits in a nice small Thinktank Mirroless Mover 25i bags. The whole lot weighs less than 1.5kgFeedback
Choose a suitable flower and photographic it against a plain background to make it easier to mask. You can use star brushes to create the effect, but Topaz Star Effect allows you to adjust number of points, size, glow, ring glow, angle etc etc. Star Effects does need bright spots to form the stars on so that is why I created the black layer with white dots.
