Lord Akersten's Retreat

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/fo...&pictureid=327

Canon 1Ds3 - EF 16-35mm F2.8L USM @ 16mm - Singh-Ray 3_Stop GND FIlter. 5 Second Exposure @ F22 @ ISO 100.

The image looks artificial because the foreground is so much brighter than the sky. Is this deliberate? But otherwise, a nice image and technically perfect.

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Originally Posted by Blazing fire

The image looks artificial because the foreground is so much brighter than the sky. Is this deliberate? But otherwise, a nice image and technically perfect.

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Thanks for the feedback - to be honest, the levels of the foregroud were bugging me a bit too, so I've knocked them back a bit now. They were caused by having a 3-Stop GND filter on the camera, which was a little mich, but it's all I had on me.

Great picture Colin. I always love how vibrant you get the colors in the reflections. I'm not much of a fan of leaving the pincushin in, there is slight aliasing on the left and right edges, quite a distraction to me. Did you use a flash to illuminate the foreground? Very interesting with it being lit and the hills dark :)

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Originally Posted by KentDub

Great picture Colin. I always love how vibrant you get the colors in the reflections. I'm not much of a fan of leaving the pincushin in, there is slight aliasing on the left and right edges, quite a distraction to me. Did you use a flash to illuminate the foreground? Very interesting with it being lit and the hills dark :)

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Hi Kent,

Thanks for the kind words. The pincusion was a bit of an experiment - I'll do a version without it to see how it looks. Truth be known it was about 1:30am when I finished and the idea of sleep was more apealing than more PP work at that stage!

I used a 3-Stop hard-edge filter to knock back the sky and water, which left the foreground a wee bit bright, but I've also knocked that back with a bit more PP. In reality I probably didn't need the filter for this shot as I was shooting into the sun; I might try it again with my 14mm lens tonight and see how it goes.

Is there anyway to reduce the local contrast of the foreground? It still looks "off"

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Originally Posted by Blazing fire

Is there anyway to reduce the local contrast of the foreground? It still looks "off"

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Colin,

Can I try to improve your this IMAGE

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Originally Posted by ashwin

Colin,

Can I try to improve your this IMAGE

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Sure - I've just finished re-working it myself, with the final version / name being ...

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/fo...&pictureid=331
https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/fo...&pictureid=331

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Originally Posted by Colin Southern

Sure - I've just finished re-working it myself, with the final version / name being ...

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This is what I could do for you.... your comments please

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/fo...9&d=1258105997

Now it looks worse. I guess I don't give good recommendations! :D

Upon re-looking, it does look more natural, but still "off".

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Originally Posted by ashwin

This is what I could do for you.... your comments please

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Hi Ashwin,

Thanks for doing that, but to be honest, I really can't see any difference (apart from an "oops" in the right-hand border) :( (I've got got up, so perhaps my eyes are still a bit too blurry!).

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Originally Posted by Blazing fire

Now it looks worse. I guess I don't give good recommendations! :D

Upon re-looking, it does look more natural, but still "off".

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The more I looked at my "darkened foreground" version, the more I didn't like it - so I started again from scratch on my primary PP PC. The "revised edition is actually 32 stacked frames - carefully adjusted in the RAW converter. I didn't touch the foreground in the end.

I found that it's one of those images that looks better the bigger you see it - so I've uploaded a fairly high resolution version in case anyone wants to take a look at the "bigger picture" (I've currently got it set as my wallpaper and I'm pretty happy with how it looks).

The picture in the first post is quite bad. The one in post #8 is decent.

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Originally Posted by Blazing fire

The picture in the first post is quite bad. The one in post #8 is decent.

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Hmmm - just wondering if you've re-profiled your monitor recently? :eek:

I prefer #8, mainly due to the tighter crop to be rid of the nasty pin-cushioning, which also removes a chunk of disturbing cloud on the left.

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Originally Posted by Dave Humphries

I prefer #8, mainly due to the tighter crop to be rid of the nasty pin-cushioning, which also removes a chunk of disturbing cloud on the left.

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Thanks Dave. The first was just a "proof of concept", at 1:20am - it was taken from a single frame and I left the pincushioning in for "something different". To be honest, I quite like the pincushioning effect, but it probably needs a thinner gray stroke around it though.

The "real" image is 32 stacked frames (take a close look at the noise levels and see if you like ;)), with better "light of day" RAW adjustments.

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Originally Posted by Colin Southern

(take a close look at the noise levels and see if you like ;))

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Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, it's so quiet I can hear myself breathing :)

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Originally Posted by Blazing fire

Upon re-looking, it does look more natural, but still "off".

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This is what I have done....... natural look to the picture.,