PDA

View Full Version : Hiram Maine Falls Below The Dam



Grady Weed
11-19-2009, 04:37 PM
This is a small section of the falls that are created when the water levels are changed due to heavy rains etc. It can change within seconds without warning. Some rather large trees float over the top and some huge boulders can be dislodged during the process. Therefore you have to choosy when you go to photograph them. It is hard to find a good clean spot and it is not wise to go too far out in the riverbed. As it is I was almost 50 yards from the bank. I tried to isolate as much of the two central falls and not get any debris into the frame. This is full frame for a 12x18 print. Gitzo Tripod mounted, ball head, double bubble, cable release used.

Canon EOS 5D, Shooting Date/Time: 11/19/2009 15:44:52, Shutter Speed 0.6Sec. Av(Aperture Value) F32, Evaluative metering, Exposure Compensation +1 1/3, shaded and low light, ISO 100, Lens: EF28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM, Focal Length: 70.0 mm, RAW. Post production CS4, shadows and highlights converted to B&W, minor contrast.

As some of you might tell from this image, I have not done too much in the way of water fall images. Most falls around here are a 2-4 mile hike into the woods over very rough and steep terrain. So as this is close by to the road and only a 1/4 mile hike in, and my health allowed me to just enough energy to go in and stay for 1/2 hour, I choose this spot to try for a keeper. What do you like? What don't you like? Please feel free to suggest. Thanks for looking.

Todd Frost
11-19-2009, 05:39 PM
Very nice comp, multiple diagonals work nicely. Your choice of the b/w conversion was well thought out. Glad to see you are getting out! My prayers are with you for continued healing.
Todd

Dennis "Curly" Buchner
11-19-2009, 09:49 PM
Hi Grady, glad you could get out and shoot this awesome falls. I like this comp, but I like a little more contrast in BW. Also the highlights are a tad too bright.

I hope you moved right and got the falls you cut off and the flow going right as that looks like a good comp. There are many different comps in this falls and I could spend a day shooting this cool falls.

I did a fast touch up in silver efex pro.

I hope you are getting stronger everyday so you can shoot more of these great places in Maine and share

Ramesh Adkoli
11-20-2009, 08:07 AM
I liked the black and white rendering of the image, Grady. The silky whites of the water and dark tones of the rocks contrast well. TFS. Take care.

regards,
ramesh

Dave Mills
11-20-2009, 10:18 AM
Hi Grady, Glad to see you out there!! I feel you isolated an interesting composition. Nice softness to the image with even lighting. Dennis brought out alot of detail but my preference would probably lie somewhere between the two. I don't know what was there but if possible a bit more room to the bottom flow would have been desireable for my taste...

Roman Kurywczak
11-20-2009, 12:46 PM
Hey Bud,
Glad to see you getting out a bit! VG job keeping distracting elements of the falls out and it has a nice movement through the frame. I felt a lot like Dave About this image and while part of me likes Dennis's re-do i was leaning more like Dave on something in between so I gave it a shot.
Reverse S-curve to tame the contrast.....instantly brought out more detail (Robert has the tutorial on it in the Tonal range tweaks). Shadow/Highlights with the shadows around 25/50/30 and the highlights around the same. I then added blacks in selective colot to the whites/neutrals and black....with one more pass in selective color to the blacks so it went from white to black. Final step was a few points down on brightness while going up a touch on contrast.
This is somewhere in between the 2 but let me know your thoughts.

Grady Weed
11-20-2009, 05:07 PM
Dave and Roman, I appreciate the feedback and although I liked Curly's repost using Silver FX Pro I felt it was a bit too much leaving the lower left rock looking like it was oversharpened, but he was steering me in the right direction, and I appreciate that too. I also liked something in between as you did, just not quite as heavy in the adjustment of the highlights. I now have CS4, which allows me a lot more latitude and more choices to adjust to what I saw. So I went in to Shadows and Highlights and applied the reverse S curve and boosted the levels black. I believe this is what I would go to print with.

As to Dave's suggestion of going lower to have more of the falls in a pool, there was no more room as the debris was right below my feet and would have been in the picture, so I basically got what could be gotten. It does bear, though, a second attempt to isolate other areas. I will have to wait for the water levels to not be so high. Thanks everyone for your feedback.

Roman Kurywczak
11-21-2009, 07:15 PM
Hey Grady,
Nice job on the rework! Darker black not everyones cup of tea so undertandable. Nice feature in CS4....still working in 2 because wasn't sure it was all that.....the S/H improvement might be worth it alone! Thanks for the fedback and you definitely brought it up a notch!