Whereas I love messing around with photography and effects, things don't always turn out as I might like.

Having grown up with *film* photography *(yes, I'm old!)* experimentation was pretty much limited by my *(very limited)* budget for film and processing. Here in the digital age, we can experiment endlessly, at little cost but some time and sweat equity.

![RD0215-Fuchsia1.jpg](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQme6xTV6kEn7w1qfMsBqwP1NYNSDFC4NTsL1ToksUbrqj6/RD0215-Fuchsia1.jpg)

These brilliantly bright fuchsias grow in a large bush by our front entrance. Yes, I know this a *"greenhouse plant"* in many parts of the world... around here, we stick 'em in the ground, and they grow.

And yes, that's really their natural color.

Turning them into a black-and-white is actually sort of boring:

![RD0215-Fuchsia1bw.jpg](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmVzDDn93jeVAJCeZDMiTwMnAcXXGRNuHg4qA6Z49g1hfa/RD0215-Fuchsia1bw.jpg)

Whereas I *do* like black-and-white images, I do *not* subscribe to the artistic school of thought that *the moment it is black-and-white, it's suddenly ART.*

No. No it isn't. There's a whole separate *ART* to effective black-and-white photography that's far beyond the scope of this limited post.

In this case, the B&W is pretty much a *"meh"* outcome.

So maybe we can make it a little bit more artistic by applying some art filters:

![RD0215-Fuchsia-art1.jpg](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmVtoCBL4YV6o4S1n7p5htZbXcL9bND3LwNR9tyRwG1zoG/RD0215-Fuchsia-art1.jpg)

Whereas this "heat haze" filter might be visually interesting on some level, I don't like the fact that I couldn't get it to *"look like anything"* and still keep the vibrant fresh colors of the original photo.

So here, the original wins again.

With a totally different art filter:

![RD0215-Fuchsia-art2.jpg](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmbspf4wJRdUBJNYSJHoF2cxyrRwS7DEVHYGoFDcYNizCF/RD0215-Fuchsia-art2.jpg)

This more of a stained glass/graffiti look, and while it's certainly *interesting,* it actually becomes hard to tell what we started out with. Maybe I'm just too much of a *realist* in this context, but I am back to liking the original version the best.

So what was really the *point* of this little creative exercise? 

Mostly that it's easy to *overdo* things, in the name of *"creativity."* Not every benefits from being seen with a *new* approach, and not everything needs to be *improved* in order for it to be worthy.

One of the other things I have noticed about growing up in *"the age of film,"* is that I tend to spend more looking at things before I *"pull the trigger"* on the camera... and that has become particularly evident to me when I'm out and about with my 20-something kids who come home from a hike with *hundreds* of shots *(and video clips)* taken with their smartphones, while I *might* have 50 or so shots on my camera memory card.

Anyway, just remember that if you *"got it right"* in the first place, you don't really need to overprocess a photo!

Thanks for reading!

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***2019.09.17***
***0215***