Canon 20D, Canon 100-400mm L I.S. @ 115mm, iso 400.
Exposure for the land was 1/320 sec @ f5.6.
Exposure for the sky was 1/5000 sec @ f5.6.
Gitzo 1548/B1, Full frame, Neatimage, levels, curves, hue/saturation,
blended exposures.
Hi,
Not had much oppurtunity to process or post anything lately but here's one from a couple of weeks ago from my favourite location shortly before sunset and as a slight mist was beginning to form.
All comments always welcome and appreciated.
Posted by Stuart McCrae on September 30, 2007 at 5:44 PM
It's a great image,but I cant decide about the grey band in the middle,if the top section of sky continued down to the tree line it would maybe sit better in my eyes.
Like the comp,the horses with the sun above and a nice fg too....
How do you mean Tom. Is it the grey part of the sky that's too dark and would benefit from being lighter or is it my poor blending that's left a slight 'bloom' above the tree line.
Posted by Brian Phipps on October 1, 2007 at 3:41 AM
HI Justin,
I like the image how it is, but that just me!
Your cloning must be superb, not a person in sight, it must have taken you ages!
Posted by Andy Astbury on October 1, 2007 at 3:50 AM
I don't know about Tom thoughts. but to me the DR looks a bit strange because the sun appears like a setting sun when in fact there must have been at least an hours worth of daylight left - the lighting of the FG doesn't match the visual 'effect' of the sun.
But there are always 'sureal' lighting effects in nature so I think it's a well executed HDR merge Justin
Thanks all for the helpful comments.I've yet to blend two exposures that I'm entirely happy with so find comments regarding this aspect a big help.
Must buy some Lee grads instead.
Thanks for explaining Tom, I see what you mean now. I went back to the raw file to have a look and it's most strange as there's not the slightest variation of colour or texture/definition in that grey cloud whatsoever.It's a virtual solid block of colour as seen in the 100% crop below which is as it came out of the camera apart from converting it to sRGB.Most strange.
Posted by Elliott Neep on October 1, 2007 at 10:12 AM
Yep, it detracts from a beautiful scene. Sorry Justin, this one's not for me. Its funny though, I've plaid around with exposures and HDR, but I've gone back to filters. The effect just isn't the same.
It's good image Justin! And for grads, it's a good idea to try them and compare results. That way you'll be able to get what you want with both methods.
Cheers,
Marko
Posted by David Clapp on October 3, 2007 at 12:18 PM
"Must buy some Lee grads instead."
NO DONT DO IT! Just work on the technique a little more first. I havent used a grad since... err last week actually... but it was like the same reason I try celery again even though I know I dont like it. Your blend is far too agressive, you need to be much more subtle and build the blend one into the other with softer opacity. Have another go.
Thanks Marko and David for the advice on the grads. Think I'll persevere with the exposure blending for the time being, I'm certainly not in a rush to spend all that money on the Lee filters unless I'm as sure as I can be that that's the route I want to go down.
David, I did actually try building it up with a very low opacity setting.Trouble I have is if you overlap the trees in the slightest you un-naturaly darken them and if you steer clear of them you get an unnatural halo around them from thebrighter sky.I find it a nightmare trying to brush round all the intricate tree-tops with the whole image set to fit on screen,and of course if you zoom right in to get a better view of what you're doing then everytime you need to scroll the image across you have to start a new brush stroke which starts making the overlapping strokes all uneven and patchy looking despite a very soft edged brush and an extremely low opacity setting
Discussion
18 repliesExposure for the land was 1/320 sec @ f5.6.
Exposure for the sky was 1/5000 sec @ f5.6.
Gitzo 1548/B1, Full frame, Neatimage, levels, curves, hue/saturation,
blended exposures.
Hi,
Not had much oppurtunity to process or post anything lately but here's one from a couple of weeks ago from my favourite location shortly before sunset and as a slight mist was beginning to form.
All comments always welcome and appreciated.
Like the comp,the horses with the sun above and a nice fg too....
Stu.
I like the image how it is, but that just me!
Your cloning must be superb, not a person in sight, it must have taken you ages!
But there are always 'sureal' lighting effects in nature so I think it's a well executed HDR merge Justin
LOL
Beautiful - looks good to me!
David
I really like this too, plenty going on and thats what I like. You must spend hours at this spot.
Danny
I'm with Danny on this. I really like the scene. The grey cloud band in the middle looks a bit featureless but doesn't distract too much.
Rob
Full at atmosphere, very much a New Forest scene, like it.
Tim
Its the band of thick dark cloud, there is no defination in it which splits the image starkly, it looks like a composite rather than a HDR.
T
I think I see what Tom is saying but I like the image....
Must buy some Lee grads instead.
Thanks for explaining Tom, I see what you mean now. I went back to the raw file to have a look and it's most strange as there's not the slightest variation of colour or texture/definition in that grey cloud whatsoever.It's a virtual solid block of colour as seen in the 100% crop below which is as it came out of the camera apart from converting it to sRGB.Most strange.
The interaction of the ponies and overall composition works a treat for me.
Alan
Cheers,
Marko
NO DONT DO IT! Just work on the technique a little more first. I havent used a grad since... err last week actually... but it was like the same reason I try celery again even though I know I dont like it. Your blend is far too agressive, you need to be much more subtle and build the blend one into the other with softer opacity. Have another go.
David, I did actually try building it up with a very low opacity setting.Trouble I have is if you overlap the trees in the slightest you un-naturaly darken them and if you steer clear of them you get an unnatural halo around them from thebrighter sky.I find it a nightmare trying to brush round all the intricate tree-tops with the whole image set to fit on screen,and of course if you zoom right in to get a better view of what you're doing then everytime you need to scroll the image across you have to start a new brush stroke which starts making the overlapping strokes all uneven and patchy looking despite a very soft edged brush and an extremely low opacity setting