Buttermere and Fleetwith Pike

Finally got round to doing some prints to hang on my walls

Long standing members may recall this image from 2004......, but when first posted my Photoshop skills were just about none existant. So armed with 3 additional years of knowledge and a renewed vigour I've had another go at the processing.

Techs Canon 1DmkI, and a 28-135 at 35mm, iso 200 1/8s at F22 (before I knew about diffraction softening ) and tripod.

For those MegaPixel junkies, despite being only a 4MP CCD sensor the old 1D was more than capable of turning out stunning A3 prints

The processing techie challange was to lift the dark foreground rocks and right hand slope in deep shadow without sacrificing too much detail on Fleetwith Pike - and without using shadow highlight tool which can produce unsightly halos at the amount of contrast reduction needed.

My method was the old tried and tested routine used before CS2 came along: duplicate the original layer; desaturate the duplicate layer; apply gausian blur of about 15%; invert the layer to a negative; change the layer property to overlay; and finally reduce opacity of the negative layer to around 40%

The process is effectively a quick and dirty HDR without resorting to multiple exposure stacking and blending.

It's a lovely place Mike and you did very well extracting detail from shadows. The light wasn't on your side though. Haze killed saturation and detail in background part of your photo.
Never the less. Since it looks like you have enough detail in shadow parts of your photo, I would try double RAW processing, one for highlights and another for shadows and would blend them together trying to restore some colour in upper parts of your image.
BDW was that 1D the camera you got after Texel workshop?


Cheers,
Marko

I know the light wasn't doing you any favours Mike, but the image looks like one of those great 19th century oil landscapes - especially the top half the frame - brilliant

As a photograph I think I'd have a crack at the layer blending Marko suggested - but I do like it as it is, nice one

Mike,

Thanks for the tip - quick question - do you do this processing before or after you do other processing like levels, curves etc?

Mmmm this image is nice - I bet it would make a nice card

Adrian

I would like to see this at the A3 size i don't think this size is doing it any justice. Also the 4:3 format does not seem right for me, I would prefer a more widescreen effect more like the eye sees it, but that is just my taste. I like the overall image though and the water looks like glass.

Cheers
Brian

Lovely shot Mike, and i do feel that Buttermere is best suited to these high-level shots.

Ive always had great difficulty finding suitable lake-level compositions with this lake in particular [although that is most likely due to my lack of a 'landscape eye'}.

The lighting conditions seem very familiar to me, for this area, and i feel you have pulled off a fine result with what you were given

Ive also been tempted to revisit some old frames of mine, but although my PS skills must have improved {hopefully }, my flatbed scanner remains as dodgy now, as it was when i first got it

Nicely done!

Alan

Adrian

The contrast mask is done towards the end but before any sharpening, If the image ends up too flat you can boost the contrast again by either fading the layer more or flattening the layers and tweaking the overall image again, or applying a final "contrast boost" sharpening pass of: 20%, 30R, 2Threshold - or thereabouts - a good way of reducing any general grey mugginess in an image

I'll have a go at standard HDR 2 frame blend tonight as well, but as it stands I like the moodiness of the 'Pike greying out.

Brian - yep at A3 size the level of detail in the line of trees at the end of Buttermere really comes out. - incidentally the original crop is 297/210 pre-prepared for A4/A3 printing which is very close to 4:3rds format - I just downsized the file to 720 pixels for web presentation

Marko - yes that was indeed my first DSLR after opening my eyes at Texel (weren't we the only 2 film users there?) - I really regret selling it now, the richer colours from those older CCD sensors still don't seem to be matched by the modern low noise CMOS sensors

Just looked out my bedroom window, towards ennerdale/crummock/loweswater/buttermere, and the skys are littered with vapour trails

Hope you don't mind me mentioning this in your posting Mike, but it may pre-warn possible landscape photography visitors who plan on visiting this area at this particular time of year {in chilly/crisp conditions}.

Alan

Ah, to be able to look out of a window like that, I have the same vapour trails problem, but only a view of Brunel west coast main railway line I agree it does seem harder and harder to get clean skies these days - it's normal to have 6 aircraft in view at any time here in sunny downtown Reading

Mike,

Thanks for the info and errr it was 8 trails this morning

Adrian

A nice shot of a beautiful scene, I agree with the comments about the haze. Its a real shame, but you have made the most of what you had, very well done.

Paul

A nice shot of a bearutiful scene, I agree with the comments about the haze. Its a real shame, but you have made the most of what you had, very well done.

Paul

FWIW I don't think that the haze is that much of a problem - artists put in the impression of haze in paintings to give the impression of distance, and this shot has a real gentle painterly quality.

Mark

I think this is a very pleasing image but have to disagree about the haze. Personally I love haze and hate perfectly clear weather - and as Mark says it adds depth. Tristan