Moonlight shadows REPOST
by Shantikara Valuska
Moonlight shadows / -25 celsius
Last winter I went to the Val Roseg valley in Engadin, Switzerland.
It was freezing cold, -25 celsius. It was an interesting experience to work in such temperature. I was mostly fine, except my feet was a little cold after 1 hour standing there. And the cold was very challenging for the poor camera. It was totally frozen, but working without any problem. (Except for the battery which died after 1 hour.)
The landscape was really magical in the moonlight. There was a heavy snowfall on the previous day. Although the moonlight was nice for the landscape, for the stars it was not good. For this 2 exposure would have been ideal, but in this cold, this was my best attempt.
Although there's not much color, the black and white conversion was not working for the shot.
It may look also bit dark on the white background.
Thank you for looking, comments and critique are welcome.
Shantikara
Canon 40D + EF 17-40
Iso 100, f/9, 6 min
Comments
10 commentsI like the moonlight and the way you've kept it pretty dark though, for a night feel. Looks like just an amazing place to be. You can find some of the most wonderful solitude in places like this. Nothing is quite still the way night and winter are, deep in the mountains.
Mark, I understand your point with the leading line. I was the first time in this area and I thought that the big peaks (Piz Roseg and Piz Bernina) would dominate the valley. Unfortunately they are behind the mountainside on the left. In the summer I could have find some better composition. In the morning I did go further, but even with snowshoes it was not easy in the deep new snow, through the streams and everything.
Next time I will come in the summer.
About the stars, I will try to do lighten them, but they were really faint in the moonlight.
I think this is an excellent moonlit landscape image! Very real in the sense of being out there in the landscape in the moon light. I would agree with others about wanting to see some stars, although I certainly understand they aren't as prominent with a bright moon sky. Still, I think this is well captured.
Lon
I tried to pull out some stars, it was not easy. I tried levels, curves, but nothing really helped. There is very small tonal difference between the sky and the star trails. Finally I figured out the trick: I used a special unsharp mask: amount 500%, radius 10 pixel, threshold 25. Like this the sharpening's white part was applied only to the stars very strongly. Then I used an 50-60% layer opacity.
It is still not perfect, the very faint ones are hardly visible, but a little better
The problem was with the moon's direction, it was in front of me, that's why the stars are week. I did some night shots even with full moon, and if the moon is from the side than the stars can be still strong.
Edit: Just saw the repost.