Approaching Thunderstorm

[Andreas Freund]

Hi all,

I hope you all had a nice holiday. :)

I would like to present you a picture, which I took last year on Cape Hatteras, NC. The picture shows the Frisco Pier. At this day a thunderstorm was approaching and I tried to catch this dramatic scene. When I was working on this picture I was thinking about cropping the picture on the right side. But I noticed that I would lose the bright sun spot in the upper right corner. So I didn't do it!

I am looking forward to get your comments about the picture :)

Sony Alpha 100
Sony 18- 70mm f3.5-5.6 DT
f/18
1/30s
ISO 100

processed in LR 2.6, PS CS4 and Nik Software

[Dave Mills]

Hi Andreas, I basically like the image but for my taste felt it was a bit dark so I applied a levels adjustment and used a small amount of highlight adj to put more definition in the clouds. Now that I've done all this I realise that the brighter area in the upper right could be pulling the eye into that area. I also noticed the image appears a bit soft. If you shot this a 1/30 of a sec without a tripod it would be an easy thing to slightly move the camera. Some might prefer the original post since it does carry more mood. Just another way of presentation...
Wonder if you took other comps of this since the pier would also make a very interesting pano...

[Peter Farrell]

I thought that pier looked familiar. I remember about 8-10 years ago there was an Australian themed restaurant in the pier house. I had some Kangaroo soup. Having visited the NC Outer Banks yearly for the past 25 years or so; I can say from experience that you have captured the approaching storm, from a color standpoint, perfectly. In DMills re-post, which I also like, the sky is a little to blue. I agree with your desicion to not crop out the brighter portion of the sky as it helps the viewer get the feel of the storms track.
Well done!
Peter

[Roman Kurywczak]

Hi Andreas,
I agree that it does need a tweak and a bit of sharpness.....so I played with it. At least 7 layers later.....from levels to brightness contrast and even a reverse s-curve thrown in.......a bit of a pullback on blue saturation and then sharpening....after that a slight crop on the brightest area...and here is my take. Let me know your thoughts.

[Andreas Freund]

First of all thank you very much for your comments and your suggestions. Roman and Dave you are both right that the picture needs some sharpness!

Roman I am impressed with your version. I think this is how the picture should look like. I will try to process the photo in Photoshop and see if I can achive the same result as you did. I am really curious if I can make it :)

Hey, I wish you all a happy new year.

[Dennis "Curly" Buchner]

I love this type of weather to get dramatic images