This is a shot that has bothered me since lat year when I took it. I caused a foolish amount of ecological damage to scramble up this embankment to get those lucrative ferns in a shot with Wauna Falls. But, despite my best PS efforts, I have never been able to really bring them out. Does anyone have any ideas?
Now I worry they are just dead weight at the bottom, would you just crop them, crop anywhere? Trash the shot? Your feedback is always appreciated, thanks!
Wuana Falls is the first major waterfall along an Eagle Creek tributary, bushwhack.
Andy, A: don't destroy the mosses and ferns - you already knew that. B: I'd try a local USM contrast adjustment and selective shadow burning and mid-tone dodging to bring them out as seen in this rework I'm including. This just took a second. I could get it more accurate if I worked harder at it. USM contrast adjustment on a full-res image in this case should be something like radius - 30, threshold 0, amount 40.
Wow, thanks marc! You know, I now remember a long time ago when I was just learning photoshop I remember reading something about that technique but I had totally forgotten. Oh I am going to have fun playing with this now....
Good thing the growth rate in the gorge is so insane that my tek was probably invisible a week later
you got spring fever, so you decided to cough in the forum with this rich green mossy image of a gorge waterfall, thereby infecting everyone in the forum. THANKS A LOT ANDY!
Mark, I'm not sure what else I can say about the techniques. You're probably aware that there is far more to the dodge/burn technique than a simple lighten or darken brush. By right-clicking the dodge/burn tool, you can choose a highlight, midtone or shadow dodge/burn. All of which are essential to many of my images, and the use of each does takes a bit of practice and natural artistic ability in order to know when and how to use each one, and how much of each to apply. The USM contrast was the major step to improving the foreground here, but the shadow burn was also important, because it darkened the lower shadow areas only, increasing contrast by improving separation from the ferns, which were mostly in the mid-tone range. I then took a slight mid-tone dodge over some select ferns to separate them even further. All in about 1 minute. Honestly, people think I know way more about PS than I do, and for all their fancy time consuming work - blends, masks, etc. The vast majority of my modifications are varying combinations of dodging and burning - never to the point of damaging an image of course. And it dosen't take nearly as long.
Marc,
Not sure I agree that doing tone masks and using curves or dodge/burn overlay layers takes any more time that using the burn/dodge tool. Tone mask actions are automated and can be painted in the same manner - just on a mask layer. Being a mask layer is is reversible and doesn't modify the base pixels.
Tony's tone masks are a prime example of the automation actions.
I definitely agree that the bottom line is the operators artistic ability. I use curves often. I've never used Tony's masks specificly, but I won't change from anything that works for me - and I never have problems with contrast, exposure or print quality. I shouldn't have mentioned masks in general, as I do use them and creating another layer is not time consuming. Not modifying base pixels is a good reason to do so at times. But some people really do get carried away with it. Blends are what is considerably more time consuming, irrelevant to this image anyway.
Discussion
8 repliesThis is a shot that has bothered me since lat year when I took it. I caused a foolish amount of ecological damage to scramble up this embankment to get those lucrative ferns in a shot with Wauna Falls. But, despite my best PS efforts, I have never been able to really bring them out. Does anyone have any ideas?
Now I worry they are just dead weight at the bottom, would you just crop them, crop anywhere? Trash the shot? Your feedback is always appreciated, thanks!
Wuana Falls is the first major waterfall along an Eagle Creek tributary, bushwhack.
The composition does have a nice flow to it.
I'd sure like to get a little tutorial on this, Marc. I think you really improved the photo (which wasn't too bad to begin with, IMHO).
Good thing the growth rate in the gorge is so insane that my tek was probably invisible a week later
Not sure I agree that doing tone masks and using curves or dodge/burn overlay layers takes any more time that using the burn/dodge tool. Tone mask actions are automated and can be painted in the same manner - just on a mask layer. Being a mask layer is is reversible and doesn't modify the base pixels.
Tony's tone masks are a prime example of the automation actions.
An tutorial on local contrast enhancement can be found here:
Local Contrast Enhancement
I think the bottom line result is due to the operators artistic ability and eye more than anything else. This is the true art