Lake Windermere

[Iain Barker]

This is my first post in this forum. I usually post in the Avian but do try to talk some landscape photo when out walking.
This shot was taken on a cloudy dull day in March when the sun kept breaking through the clouds onto the distant hills. I tried to capture the mood of the day in this image.

Nikon D7000 sigma 70-200 f2.8 @ 180mm; 1/640 sec f8 ISO800, manual metering, HH.

Adjustments in Lightroom 5: contrast, clarity, vibrance and saturation and curves adjustments.

I am unsure of what adjustments I should be making on landscape images so any feedback on the image as a whole or the processing would be greatly appreciated.

[Diane Miller]

Lovely mood here! For me, the adjustments to make are the ones that give you a result you like.

There is a very good e-book by Michael Frye specifically discussing the processing of landscapes, but I think the processing guidelines are equally valid for any subject. He uses LR 5, but it would apply equally to ACR. It's the first one on this page. The others are excellent, too.

http://www.michaelfrye.com/books/books.html

[David Stephens]

I like it as is. I assume that there was lots of moisture in the air and you certainly caught that. The crisp image of the sailboat adds both scale and context. If you could bring out more contrast in the clouds, I'd love it more. I would expose to the right here and then try to milk what contrast there is in the clouds.

[Don Railton]

Hi Iain

Have been looking at this for a few days thinking 'how could I provide something useful' to you. Decided that I should wait until I could test what i thought you might like in PS.. Well, I have now had the chance to do that and I have not come up with any great suggestions, so...

I like the sailboat, its a big plus. I also like the light on the distant hills. I don't like as much of the overhead cloud as you have only because the cloud is featureless (although it does have a dustspot..), so IMHO you dont need as much as you have kept. Having said that, this dark cloud does set a moody atmosphere, so in line with Diannes suggestions, it depends what you are trying to convey as to if it stays or goes.. The last suggestion is that the hill behind the lake is a bit dark and short on detail, but again, is that what you wanted ..?

DON

[Iain Barker]

Thanks all for the feedback. It definitely give me a few thing to consider with this image and any future images. The image has the look I was trying to get and I agree with all the comments made. I will go back to my raw file and make some further adjustments to see if I can get more detail.

[Iain Barker]

I made a few alterations in Lightroom to the shadows hightlights and whites and changed the colour balance slightly. I also cropped some of the more featurless cloud from the top of the image.
Here is the result. Please let me know if you think it is an improvement or not.

[Don Railton]

Hi Ian

Yes I think its a lot better, the lighter fg balances more with the sun on the hills and the reduced cloud IMHO. the downside is that the noise has come up a little..

DON

[Andrew McLachlan]

Hi Iain, welcome to the Landscape forum and nice first post. I like the repost best as it has more impact than the original post. I do not mind the original crop, I think I am leaning more to preferring the original crop with the added impact of the repost. The sailboat adds the interest to this image. NIcely seen.

[Diane Miller]

I like the glowing hills that come out even more in the RP. Did you try a touch of Nik's Detail Extractor? Sometime sit can bring out some interesting features.

[Morkel Erasmus]

Nice composition and overall mood here Iain.
I think overall it just has a look of the histogram not being properly optimised - ie some areas of tonality that are muddied and underexposed. I understand it was misty/hazy and these conditions usually make exposure tricky...

[Diane Miller]

I'm not sure that optimizing all the tonal ranges in this can be done in normal raw conversion. Here it is with Nik's Detail Extractor, at a moderate %. You might want to mask it off for some of the areas, but just to show what it can do. It's more tone mapping than just normal adjustments. Sort of like Clarity on steroids.

Not meant to be a final adjustment - just to show one possibility.

And it does bring out noise. No free lunch here.