Watercolor Orchard – Before and After

I decided I would go through another before and after image creation. Looking at the opening image, I am not sure that it really shows off the effect because of the image size.  But I will share it anyway. This is a software approach inspired by an in camera technique used by Freeman Patterson.

This is our starting point. A richly saturated  HDR composite image created with Photomatix. This doesn’t have to be an HDR image, but saturated colors are good.

After opening up the original image in Photoshop I created a duplicate layer and using “Apply image” with a “Screne” lightened it up and then applied the “Gaussian blur” filter with about 30% blur. The blue sky had faded too much so I brought it back a bit using Nik Software’s Viveza (reducing the sky brightness a bit) This is the resulting image so far.

Using the original image I created another later using SIlverEfx Pro. I applied the “Antique Solarization” preset to create the image you see here.

Lastly I stacked the “solarization” layer on top of the “Blur” layer and changed the layer mode for the “solarization” layer to “Overlay”. I then adjusted the opacity to taste - ~35% in this case. The result is the opening image.

Any questions?

B&W Naturally

I have started looking at some of my foliage images as candidates for black and white conversion.  I find in the end I like both. What do you think?

Trillium.

False Solomon’s shield.

 

 

 

Station 22 in HDR

As I have written in some of my earlier blogs, one of the great things about doing photography is the people we meet. A couple days ago I went on a photography club shoot in the St John's area of Portland. Being out fairly early on a weekend morning I had the opportunity to meet with the local police and fire department personnel - all very nice people. The guys at Station 22 offered to pose for this picture. I had them hold still  for this multi-shot HDR image. Their presence gives the image a nice touch. Thanks guys! Hope you catch this blog entry. I told you the image would be a bit different. If I am out your way down the line I’ll try to bring you a print.

Earlier that morning I met a local police officer as I was shooting the old police station. He used to work there and missed the old place. It made him a bit sentimental so he said he had to suck it up before he got back on patrol;-) It is a great old building.

  Images:

1. Shot for HDR. Double processed with my grunge settings in Photomatix. The lights were lit up using NikSoft'’s Viveza (small u-point point set to full brightness, full contrast, full warmth and minus a little blue). The engine grill and firemen were  brought out a little using Viveza as well.
2. Shot for HDR from ground level with a 12mm wide angle zoom lens. Double processed with my grunge settings in Photomatix. ColorEfx Pro Midnight filter brushed around the building like a wide vignette in Photoshop. The lights were lit up using NikSoft'’s Viveza as for the first image.