Elk with the 70-200....

[Arthur Morris]

Though this image pales in comparison to some of the bull Elk images that I have seen posted here and elsewhere I am rather fond of this despite the somewhat cluttered BKGR and the angle down to the subject.

To avoid a merge between the antlers and the large fallen log I had to climb up on an even bigger fallen log and balance myself precariously :)

It was created with the Canon 70-200mm f/2.8 LI S II lens (hand held at 150mm) with the EOS-1D MIV. ISO 400. Evaluative metering +2/3 stop: 1/400 sec. at f/5.

Don't be shy; all comments welcome.

[Andrew McLachlan]

Nice one Arthur. I don't mind the fallen logs throughout the image - it is part of the environment. I wish the fallen log straight across the bottom wasn't there, but this image still works for me.

[Steve Canuel]

An interesting perspective and good view of the antlers. Nice catchlight too. This one has a pretty strong bluish/magenta cast on my admittedly uncalibrated monitor.

[Arthur Morris]

An interesting perspective and good view of the antlers. Nice catchlight too. This one has a pretty strong bluish/magenta cast on my admittedly uncalibrated monitor.

Good eye Steve. I removed some of the blue but thanks to you have done much better with this repost :) So thanks.

[Steve Canuel]

Looks better to me. The fallen, weathered logs have a much more natural look to them.

[Arthur Morris]

Thanks again for your help. I used a brand new trick that Robert O'Toole taught me: pull down the BLUE curve in Curves (or the curve for whatever color cast exists).

[Ken Watkins]

This is a lovely looking animal captured in a very good position. The dead wood in the foreground does not help, but it was there.

[Arthur Morris]

Ken and Andrew, I find the fallen log in the front no more obtrusive than the rest of them and it does complete the sort of framing triangle so I am fine with it :)

[Rachel Hollander]

Artie - repost looks great. I like the catchlight and the pose. The logs don't bother me.

TFS,
Rachel

[Roger Clark]

Art,

Nice pose on the elk, but for me the background is too bright, especially near the top. I would darken the top. You must have been up on a hill, looking down. Did you get a lower perspective?

Roger

[subhrashis]

Beautiful image, I like the two sets of converging lines I seem to see in the composition, the two upper logs, and the 2 antlers.
At 150, you must have been pretty close to him? The picture carries this intimacy, and with the eye contact, it is very engaging!

Obviously, repost is a lot better than original.

[Robert Amoruso]

Hey Artie,

The looking down here did not hurt due to the head angle and eye contact (with a catchlight no less). I was messing around with the color cast and darkening the upper part - then I say your repost and Roger's suggestion.

[Arthur Morris]

Art, Nice pose on the elk, but for me the background is too bright, especially near the top. I would darken the top. You must have been up on a hill, looking down. Did you get a lower perspective? Roger

Hi Roger, The lighter patch of grass at the top is deader grass :) I did not even notice it until you mentioned it. We were on a ridge. I thought of going down to his level but all indications were that I would have been trampled to death so I did not follow through on that. He was not liking us up on the ridge as we were close.....

[Arthur Morris]

Hey Artie, The looking down here did not hurt due to the head angle and eye contact (with a catchlight no less). I was messing around with the color cast and darkening the upper part - then I say your repost and Roger's suggestion.

How would you have tried to darken the dead grasses?

[Arthur Morris]

Beautiful image, I like the two sets of converging lines I seem to see in the composition, the two upper logs, and the 2 antlers. At 150, you must have been pretty close to him? The picture carries this intimacy, and with the eye contact, it is very engaging! Obviously, repost is a lot better than original.

Thanks Subbu. We were on a ridge right above him and he was not liking us there.... He got up from resting and walked toward us as if he was gonna come up the hill after us.

[Robert Amoruso]

Here is what I was working on.

1) Color cast using the same method you mentioned. Which works well as it warms the image at the same time.
2) Channels palette, CTRL-Click the RGB Channel to make a selection of the highlights.
3) Back to Layers Palette, create BG copy and click on the mask button at the bottom to create gray-scale mask of the selection.
4) ON the same BG copy, change blending mode to multiply and then adjusted opacity to get grass on top to tonality I liked. This left rest of the image too dark.
5) Option 1: Create Levels adjustment, lighten the remainder of image to taste and then mask out the grass so the previous correction is not affected; or
Option 2 (which I did): Create Curves adjustment and using the targeted selection, locally adjust areas in the image.

I may not have the final solution as it depends on what you want to achieve.

[denise ippolito]

Artie, I like both of the re posts but I have to admit-I need to see them side by side to tell a difference. Nice pose and the dead trees frame him in a natural way.

[Arthur Morris]

Denise beat me to the punch with her thinking as I was working on the animated GIF. I will thank Robert for his considerable effort while withholding my judgement to give the rest a chance to comment.

http://www.birdsasart.com/baacom/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/14/auto-draft/A-A-Animated-GIF.gif

[denise ippolito]

I like the brighter one. The gif really does show the difference well.

[Robert Amoruso]

Artie,

I was toggling back and forth in my history palette on the one I posted and like some of what I did but feel the image lost its "punch". I am also not liking the color cast. So here is another try.

Basically the same as before but this time on the curves blue channel correction (Step 1) I brought down the highlight end and slightly upped on the shadow end. This time I used a levels adjustment (Step 5, Option 1) to lighten the image and then masked on the light grass on top to maintain the affect of BG/Multiply adjustment (Step 2 to 4). On the BG/Multiply layer I painted black on the elk to remove the multiply affect except on the brighter portions on the back.

I like this one better then my initial effort but still don't feel I am happy with it.

--------

I made an animated gif but could not get it below the 300kb posting limit. How do you do that?

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Caveat: It seems I am getting some color shift going back to the BPN post.

[Robert Amoruso]

Artie,

Just to demo that change in colors from your 2nd post to my download, save to web and upload. The skewing is very frustrating.

Only thing I did to the 2nd post was levels adjustment 70% mid-tone slider to darken image and then painted black on everything except the bright grass on top. I then painted white on the light portions of the back and body to darken them down. Clone out the halo on the nose.

Many time I get these color shifts when working on a JPG with save for web and then going back to the BPN server. I don't get this from Save for Web from my TIFF file on my posts though.

[Arthur Morris]

Hi Robert,

I like the one in Pane 20. The best would probably be a combination of all of them :)

re:

I made an animated gif but could not get it below the 300kb posting limit. How do you do that?

I upload it to my web site and it gives me a link. Then I click on the Insert Image link in the Quick Reply box and paste the url there. It's magic :)

Caveat: It seems I am getting some color shift going back to the BPN post.

Welcome to the club!

[Roger Clark]

All,
Here is my edit (done on my uncalibrated laptop). I darkened the gress at the top, selected the elk, feathered the selection with refine edge, inverted the selection and darkened everything bu the elk. Fixed a few halos from the imperfect selection job, then an overall tweak to the image with curves, then a tweak of the blue channel to reduce the blue, again with curves.

Generally, I just use curves (a levels adjustment first too--but I didn't do that this time) and selections. I rarely use adjustment layers. For me it seems simpler and faster.

My laptop has a rather low contrast screen, so hopefully I didn't boos contrast too much.

Roger

[Charles Glatzer]

Thanks again for your help. I used a brand new trick that Robert O'Toole taught me: pull down the BLUE curve in Curves (or the curve for whatever color cast exists).

Artie,

After you choose the RGB color... Blue in this case.

Use the Draw to modify the curve (pencil icon looking tool) to click on the curves axis line, and then click on the axis line again with the Edit points to modify the curves (small squiggly icon just above the pencil). This will place equally spaced anchor points on the curve, thereafter use the click and drag to modify the curve tool (hand with arrow icon) clicking directly on the image to alter the color of a specific tonal value. You can move the anchor points closer or farther apart to tweak tonal width. Once your selected point is placed on the axis line use the arrow keys instead of your mouse/finger as you can adjust the image in very small increments that way.

FYI- you can do the same thing to alter tonal values in RGB. i do recommend changing the layer blending mode to Luminosity so as to not effect color values.

Best,

Chas

[Harshad Barve]

WOW , This is absolute learning thread and thats why I call BPN as institute , BTW as you can not get lower down How about making this HIGH angle image on field , Just a thought
TFS

[Arthur Morris]

Hey Roger, Thanks for the repost. It is too dark for me :)

Chas, Thanks. But you lost me :)

[Charles Glatzer]

Hey Roger, Thanks for the repost. It is too dark for me :)

Chas, Thanks. But you lost me :)

Artie,

Open the Curves Adjustment layer and Select Blue. Look along the left side for icons. See attached image ... (#1) click on axis line first with pencil looking icon, and then (#2) click with the icon directly above it to place equally spaced anchor points across the line. If you then (#3) click within the image with the adjustment tool it will palce a point on the line allowing you to tweak the color in the particular tonal range selected. You can click and drag the anchor points on the line higher and lower near the selected point to expand or contract the tonal values. Use the arrow keys on keypad to move active pt in small increments.

Hope this helps.

Chas

[Roger Clark]

Hey Roger, Thanks for the repost. It is too dark for me :)


Artie,
The elk is the same brightness, only the background is darker. Is that what you mean (the background is too dark)?

Roger