The judge considered this against another image for first place. The other image was what might be called a safe, conventional photo with a large impressive sky (the judge admitted that he liked big skys). Mine, I felt, was a more original image with unusual toning effects. However, the judge eventually went for the 'safe' image. I entered this more as an experiment to gauge reactions rather in the hope of getting top marks.
So how did I get this? To take the photo I used a low tripod to get the camera well down and took a bracketed set of 3 (-2 stops, normal exposure, +2 stops). This was processed in Photomatix HDR software using its default settings which gave this photo:
This then had a curves adjustment layer which gave me:
Followed by a hue/saturation adjustment layer:
Followed by a gradient map adjustment layer which gives a slight sepia monochrome image:
With the gradient map in position I play with the curves and hue settings until I get an image I like.
As this version was too boring I duplicated the background layer and brought it to the top of the stack. I then played around with the blending and opacity settings until I got the final version:
I have found that different images respond in different ways to the technique which then needs adapting. You can see a larger version of this in my Featured Photographs Gallery.
0 comments:
Post a Comment