Posted by Rod Chandler on February 4, 2009 at 7:54 PM
This is my second attempt at posting the Hallet Peak shot from Friday morning. I hope this looks better. Dave Bartlett has an amazing image that he is posting today as well. I know you all will like it. Thanks again to everyone who took the time to point out the errors.
Posted by Todd Caudle on February 4, 2009 at 10:52 PM
This is approximately 3,245,973.8% BETTER! I would be proud to claim this as my own in a heartbeat.
Posted by Kalin Wilson on February 5, 2009 at 12:19 AM
Great work on the light on the peak and clouds!
I can still see a hint of the halos around the trees. Did you blend another exposure for the trees or is it sharpening artifacts?
Depending on what you're using for sharpening, you might need to sharpen the trees on a separate layer and use a mask to keep the halos from spreading across the background.
Sharpening dark objects against a bright background is notoriously hard. I rely on the PK sharpener tools. I get much more predictable results that I ever got with unsharp mask alone.
Nice color too!
Posted by John Mumaw on February 5, 2009 at 8:14 AM
I like the fact that you have the trees as a foreground and the ridge as a midground.
Really adds some depth and dimension to an amazing scene unfolding.
Having detail showing in the trees is a bonus.
Posted by Don Grall on February 5, 2009 at 11:39 AM
Great shot, Rod. Really shows Hallett's rugged, dangerous side, and I'm always a sucker for dramatic cloudscapes at sunrise.
Posted by Erik Stensland on February 5, 2009 at 12:03 PM
This is a significant improvement. There are still some gentle halos around the trees, but it isn't obvious. It certainly makes Hallett feel mysterious and rugged.
Posted by Mel Ladewig on February 5, 2009 at 12:58 PM
I agree with everyone. This is a big improvement over the last post. Like Erik and Kalin, I see a soft halo around the trees. A couple ways to resolve this could be
1) You mentioned before that you use shadow/highlight to makes some adjustments. If so I have an article from a recent View Camera magazine on this topic that indicated using a much larger diameter in Shadow/Highlight will make the transition seemless. I'll try to find it when I'm home. I don't use shadow/highlight very often, so I'll have to look this up.
2) Use a dark-dark luminosity mask to seamlessly mask that darker portion of the image. I'd be happy to point you in the right direction for this if you aren't familiar with the process.
3) If you manually blended the layers, use a much broader brush when you blend the layers around the trees.
Posted by Rod Chandler on February 5, 2009 at 4:07 PM
Kalin and Mel, I did not blend another exposure. For sharpening I simply used the sharpening filter. I did use the shadow-highlight but less than 10% in both cases. I also painted the foreground trees lighter with the "layer-new layer-overlay" and checked the box "fill w/overlay neutral color (50% gray)" at 15% opacity. The more I think about it, the more I think that is the issue. I probably allowed the brush to slip over the edge of the trees a tiny bit into the area behind them. I will rework it and see what happens. Thank you so much for your wonderfully constructive criticism. I am new to NPN and this is my first posting.
Posted by John Mumaw on February 5, 2009 at 5:11 PM
For sharpening I simply used the sharpening filter.
Ouch....as in Filter->Sharpen->Sharpen?
If so, this is an extremely poor and destructive way to sharpen images. Much better to use the Unsharp Mask filter.
Discussion
9 repliesI can still see a hint of the halos around the trees. Did you blend another exposure for the trees or is it sharpening artifacts?
Depending on what you're using for sharpening, you might need to sharpen the trees on a separate layer and use a mask to keep the halos from spreading across the background.
Sharpening dark objects against a bright background is notoriously hard. I rely on the PK sharpener tools. I get much more predictable results that I ever got with unsharp mask alone.
Nice color too!
Really adds some depth and dimension to an amazing scene unfolding.
Having detail showing in the trees is a bonus.
1) You mentioned before that you use shadow/highlight to makes some adjustments. If so I have an article from a recent View Camera magazine on this topic that indicated using a much larger diameter in Shadow/Highlight will make the transition seemless. I'll try to find it when I'm home. I don't use shadow/highlight very often, so I'll have to look this up.
2) Use a dark-dark luminosity mask to seamlessly mask that darker portion of the image. I'd be happy to point you in the right direction for this if you aren't familiar with the process.
3) If you manually blended the layers, use a much broader brush when you blend the layers around the trees.
Ouch....as in Filter->Sharpen->Sharpen?
If so, this is an extremely poor and destructive way to sharpen images. Much better to use the Unsharp Mask filter.
If not, then please pardon this post.