Is That Sunlight?

Earlier this afternoon, I was out in the backyard,

looking at all the signs of spring.

As you've seen in previous posts, there

are roses blooming along the fence-line,

as well as the beginning sprouts of pears in a near-by tree.

Walking by this flower, I noticed that the sunlight 

seemed to be shining through it, since it was evening

and the sun was settling behind the fence.

Too quickly, I snapped a couple of photos...

then realized that the shutter speed was incorrect,

resulting in over-exposed photos.
There was also some lens flare, which
I didn't want to include, so I made sure
to shield the lens with
my hand (since I don't own a lens hood, yet).

After a few adjustments, I took some more photos,

which seemed OK in the camera's display.

Once downloaded into Picasa, I adjusted the Shadow

 just a bit to remove any evidence of the grassy, cluttered background.

The resulting photo makes it seem like there

was a dark background with special lighting in place.