In another post I alluded to my expertly executed messup when I took the entire series of cherry blossoms at 800 ISO by accident. I liked the look of this when I fiddled with the Orton technique that I've been seeing alot of lately. But when I added some extra layers in addition to Orton, I got this which I wondered what everyone thinks of it.
John, I fiddled with it many different ways, but the main thing I did was overexpose the sharp layer by 2 stops, overexpose the blurry layer by 1 stop (about a 15 radius Gaussian blur) and overlay those two layers in Multiply mode. This is the Orton technique.
I honestly can't remember everything else I did, but the big change was to include a good sharp exposure back into the layers. Then I adjusted the opacity of the top two layers until I got the right look. Then curves, USM, etc as usual.
The biggest surprise for me was how well this tamed the sensor noise while still leaving good detail that now I feel confident printing larger than 8 x 10. It's clean and this technique probably could be useful for blurring out backgrounds that show noise, like in birding shots, for instance.
Discussion
7 repliesIn another post I alluded to my expertly executed messup when I took the entire series of cherry blossoms at 800 ISO by accident. I liked the look of this when I fiddled with the Orton technique that I've been seeing alot of lately. But when I added some extra layers in addition to Orton, I got this which I wondered what everyone thinks of it.
Thanks for looking!
Kevin
I like it. I would like to see the whole leaf on the top instead of it being cut off. Either way, a fine image.
This is really sweet...and I agree with Ned...you are a damn fine photographer.
Kevin
John, I fiddled with it many different ways, but the main thing I did was overexpose the sharp layer by 2 stops, overexpose the blurry layer by 1 stop (about a 15 radius Gaussian blur) and overlay those two layers in Multiply mode. This is the Orton technique.
I honestly can't remember everything else I did, but the big change was to include a good sharp exposure back into the layers. Then I adjusted the opacity of the top two layers until I got the right look. Then curves, USM, etc as usual.
The biggest surprise for me was how well this tamed the sensor noise while still leaving good detail that now I feel confident printing larger than 8 x 10. It's clean and this technique probably could be useful for blurring out backgrounds that show noise, like in birding shots, for instance.
Kevin