The Remnant

The clouds are awesome Brian! I see what you mean by separating the elements. You may have to go over it by hand to bring out the different shades of black to white. Tedious but I think worth a shot. Nice work.

Brian,

Great clouds! Too bad they didn't stick around, and I certainly know what you mean. All the good ones seem to disappear at the end of the day. And I know there's an atmospheric explanation to it.

Tough call on trying to separate the foreground. and by that do you mean the foreground hill? I can see that being tough to separate especially since it seems to be connected through the background. I suppose you could do some hand painting/masking, but would be tough as Dean suggests. But may be worth a try.

I wanted to ask about the peaks in the distance. The tops all seem dark which makes me think of a hard grad, but I don't think that's the case - are they naturally darker? OR a different color and then the b&w conversion makes the color a darker tone? I think the tones and contrast in the clouds are great. If you could somehow increase the midtone contrast throughout the bottom part of the image, that could help. Wish I had some better suggestions. Definitely worth working on.

Lon

Brian, Those clouds look great and I like this scene with the b/w conversion. I think Dean and Lon have given some thoughts that might help with the seperation of the foreground. I'm not really sure how you would do it otherwise, but I think it looks pretty good as you have it. I know that feeling of the clouds vanishing before sunset all to well myself... Seems to happen to me most of the time.

Nick Bristol
Lone Rock, WI

Brian, the clouds are doubtlessly the main elements of interest in this image for me. In my opinion you handled the b&w conversion well to show the drama in the sky.

To my eye the top of the mountain chain is a bit too dark compared to the foreground. That is just the opposite to what one might expect. I am not sure whether this is the effect of a GND filter or from post processing. Nevertheless, it is an intriguing image to me.

Peter

Thanks for the comments everyone. A couple of things in response to the questions - when I mention that I am having a hard time achieving separation between the foreground and the background I am talking about the foreground hill - especially toward the top of the hill. It just seems to blend in too much with the background. Using luminosity painting techniques I darkened the left side of the foreground hill and lightened the tonality of the background but it still didn't provide quite enough tonal separation. I may need to work on it a bit more - I was hesitant to push it too far.

I think the dark areas along the canyon rim are the result of processing - I didn't use a grad and this is a single exposure capture. I agree that they need to be lightened up - that should be easy enough.

If anyone is interested I took this image at Palo Duro Canyon State Park near Amarillo, TX where I live. I have had a hard time getting solid comps from here and this is definitely my best to date. It pays to keep trying!!

The comp is very good imo, Brian. I think familiarity will help in choosing comps. Look what Stan Rose has done over the years with the Great Sand Dunes. He has that place dialed in, and your repeated visits will help you do the same here. Sometimes the shapes, tones, and light conspire to rob an image of separation of it's elements. That appears to be what's going on here. I think all of the suggestions are worth pursuing, and you might try to darken the back cliffs some, and lighten the foregroud hill to see if it will bring it forward some.

Also, is the front hill actually connected to the back cliffs? If it is, you might revisit it again when a storm is approaching and move to the right to reveal the connection and actually tie them together instead of trying to separate them.

I do like the conversion and the range of tones you have, with the sky being keenly dramatic. Nice work.