I would be grateful for comments and criticism on the exposure for the following photo. It was taken handheld in a church, with a slow shutter so I know it is not as sharp as I would like, but it is the exposure I would like comments on.

I shot in raw with a M 35mm 2.0. In PSE I upped the contrast during raw conversion to keep the area on the right as dark as possible, but this has had the effect of leaving the flowers on the right underexposed. I think this is the best look for the photo, but would welcome your thoughts.

[Sailor]

Peter, I like the way you handled exposure - which is always tough on shots like this (at least for me). The only suggestion I'd offer is try cropping off some of the black space that takes up a fair portion of the photo and see what you think.

Jer

[Moggman]

I am by no means anywhere close to an expert on this, but I would agree with Sailor. Unless the blackness is a look you are going for, crop it out. Also, I don't know how possible this would be, but I would try to lighten the whole thing up a little more. The trick would be not losing the contrast of the shadow, as you said. I think the composition is very good, and I like the perspective that you chose. This would be a very tough shot for me and I don't even think I would have pulled it off this well, good job.

[Donald]

The exposure is fine, far superior to most still life / floral images posted here. Dark-light, night-day. Various painters have emulated this same approach and with florals: Flemish school especially.

[pschlute]

Thanks for the input all. Donald....that is what my work neighbour said. I have to admit that although I knew the exposure would be tough, the light/dark effect was not neccesarily what i was after, but extremely pleasing nonetheless. I guess I will persue this style a bit more.

This is what makes photography fun.