Ok I will do some before after shots. I remind you , I love to push photography . It is another obsession I have besides gardening. I will work the details. But I am still learning my camera also. I hate to RTFM. TRoth garden taken in failing light at sunset After I addressed darkness, lightened the shadows, and burned the highlights, and the addressed the overall blue tones by adding yellow. A cactus group shot that had a beautiful beam of light. I like light and I am always photographing it and it is always making me tear my hair out. This one I found flat compared to what I saw. After punching lighter the exposure all over and darkening the exposure values , I elevated the definition to accentuate the contrast in the textures. de blued it and de-greened it I think. I did take liberties with this next picture of the Kalanchoe Luciae be cause I wanted the viewer to be surrounded and swallowed by the plant. I am not always driven by reality. Usually I am, but sometimes I gotta do a "Georgia". I felt that this one was washed out from how I felt it was. This one I did go a little overboard on it. So Sue me. Here is another one from the K. luciae series. The differences are sometimes not that starling, but subtle , but the overall will be worth it. Notice the highlights have an indistinct texture and I just want to make things better even though the picture is fairly alright. I just like to fiddle. Things just seem a little fuzzy. I feel air and I don't like it. I popped the exposure lighter then darkened the exposure value, burned the highlights. I want that rich sense of space amongst the leaves and the red to pop and show the light coming through them. I wanted the texture on the leaves. I am a little distressed with the out of focus on the back highlighted leaf. The highlight is still reading as blown.. I should have gotten my tripod out so I could cut the F stop down but then the sun would have been gone. I got the fuzzy out of there . the air is clear. I can breathe now . OH god, now you know I am obsessed. You know what is weird. I can do this for peoples portfolios and I do for some artist around all over. They send me full sized files and I see if I can work them.

All three fabulous. Very professional looking. #1 could be an magazine add. #2 is just gorgeous. #3 How did you get it just as the flash went off? What's VP plugin?

Glad you found China Bride! It's a pretty one, and I remember you've taken lots of photos of it over the years. Moonlit Masquerade is looking good. Is it on rebloom? Mine had so few buds it's already finished blooming. The portulaca pot is so colorful! Do those take the heat well? I've never grown them, but my mom always has some in her garden. Debra

Yes, it's Papou. I found the name later. No, the only hosta_freak photo I have is when we were comparing hosta Pizzazz specimens. He had a great Sharp Dressed Man, so I looked for a photo of that on the Houzz, but had no luck. Many of the great old photos were lost when Photobucket started requiring a paid account to display the existing photos. When I first started posting, Gardenweb did not host photos, so everyone had to find a place to host them. As storage got cheaper, sites started hosting their own photos, and the need for Photobucket decreased. So, they changed the terms of service. By then, a lot of the posters had moved on, either from death or new interests. So, those photos are lost. This was Phil's pizzazz: Bruce didn't post a whole lot if I remember correctly. He posted the bed of his fragrant hosta every year. It was in front of his porch. I can't remember if it was plantaginea, Venus or Aphrodite. I think it was Aphrodite, though. It was a real challenge to get it to bloom. I figured if an expert like Bruce couldn't do it, I certainly couldn't. So, I didn't purchase another one when mine croaked. ken has always posted good tutorials with photos, but rarely posted hosta photos. UK hostaman posted great photos. I can't remember her name, but a lady in Canada posted lots of great photos. She think she was newhostalady's neighbor (bear in mind that I may not have remembered names correctly). bkay