Moeraki Boulders #2, New Zealand

[Jay Gould]

This is the companion to http://www.birdphotographers.net/forums/showthread.php/85360-Moeraki-Boulders-New-Zealand and was created 40 minutes before the sun started to peak over the horizon. When I saw this image with a sliver of the moon above the boulder and the clean wavy sand (I cleaned it a lot more!) it felt kinda like a Japanese garden in its simplicity.

The processing may not be completed; I am posting this in part for assistance. There appears to be a circular banding running across the top portion of the sky and I was wondering what ideas anyone had why it is there, and how if at all to get rid of it.

Camera: 5D2
Capture date/time: 30 Apr 11; 4 : 5 0AM (I had to leave spaces or the "high 5" icon appeared.)
Light condition: before sunrise
Lens: 16-35 f/2.8
Focal length:19mm
Distance:
Extender: none
Tube: none
Flash/Comp:
ISO: 100
Exp Prog: Av
Speed: 30 sec
Aperture: f/13
Exp Comp: none
Metering: Evaluative
WB: Auto
AF Drive: One-shot AF
Tripod: yes
Filter: SR GND and RGND
Crop: 25% primarily from the bottom
Images Changes: stuff I didn't like removed!

Processed in LR3 and CS5, TK Actions, Nik Sharpeners.

All C&Cs gratefully appreciated!

[Rachel Hollander]

Jay - no idea about the banding but I really like the simplicity of this, the comp and the deep colors. Well done.

TFS,
Rachel

[Dave Mills]

Nice capture Jay! Interesting how the moon is lined up with the boulder. While the moon is tiny and nondescript it's allowing the image to afford that much sky. The glow is beautiful with nice detail in the sand. There is a small sunflare(easy to remove) about and inch and half from the right side. This would also work great as a pano cropping a small amount below the moon. Sorry I can't help with the banding but it usually emanates from post processing.

[Jay Gould]

Dave, I thought about removing the sun flare and left it as this is where the sun appeared to be rising.

Technically, how would you remove it? I experimented with various uses of content aware tools.

Regarding the banding, there is the faintest hint in the original RAW; it has been amplified in PP. I am guessing that the rising sun against the various heat or cool layers in the sky had something to do with it. You gave me an idea that I am pursuing and will provide an RP tomorrow. Thanks,

[Dave Mills]

Jay, content aware might do it depending how it grabs whats around it. A careful clone would probably work since it's fairly small.

[Roman Kurywczak]

Hey Jay,
Late to the party as I have been away! I'm betting the circular banding is the result of the filter stack! Been there......done that a few times! You have to be careful when using the reverse GND on where you place the regular GND.......I try moving it up or down during exposure starting by holding the lighter area just at the top.....sliding it down during exposure. Can't really tell you haw fast.....more art than technical. So visual check and speeding up or slowing down the slide may make significant changes!
That being said.....I still like the look! You can try pulling back the yellow and red sauration on the horizon.....that should minimize most of the flaring.....often introduced or magnified in PP'ing. After that.....I would just lighten the sand a few points more on the LH side of the bolder......really make it stand out more. Another fine effort and nice to see you jumping in with the landscapers!!!

[Jay Gould]

Thanks so much for taking the time to offer help and suggestions. I did a couple of things with the RP. I had used Tony Kuyper's actions to help bring out the color and achieve what I actually saw that morning. When I turned off the action 90% of the banding disappeared in the upper sky. I added a layer mask and only applied the TK action to the lower 60% of the image. Can you see a difference in the upper 40% from the OP to the RP; I can on my monitor when the laptop screen is perpendicular to the keyboard in the area just above the moon where I see a semi-circular band in the OP.

I do not think it is from stacking the GNDs because that usually results in horizontal lines; I think. These are a few almost perfect semi-circular bands. i do not recall if I gave the filters a jiggle - I usually do when HH.

Regarding the darkness on the left side of the boulder, first it does not appear on my monitor with the full size image; it appears as a result of the compression and in fact looks slightly darker in the 800 wide image I posted on NS. I did a 5% dodge of the LLC first in the corner and then nearer to the boulder as suggested; I probably did it wrong however since I know the sun/bright light was coming from the opposite side of the boulder lightening the shadow didn't look right to me.

I also played a lot with the sun flare; I couldn't get rid of it unless perhaps i went down to large pixel level and did it one pixel at a time.

Anyone is certainly invited to have a go at any of my images; the only requirement is if I like what you did you have to do a mini-tutorial to teach me too. :w3

[Roman Kurywczak]

maybe a bit darker at 7 o'clock frame edge in the boulder shadow.....but that little bit did a lot! Sky looks better too!

[Don Lacy]

Hi Jay, I really like the concept here but the image is over processed which is causing the banding in the sky if the banding is not present in your 16 bit PSD or Tiff file then it occurred during conversion for the web. Trying to fit all that saturation into a 8 bit sRGB color space is more then the file can handle would be interested in knowing if you can see them in the original file.

[Jay Gould]

Hi Jay, I really like the concept here but the image is over processed which is causing the banding in the sky if the banding is not present in your 16 bit PSD or Tiff file then it occurred during conversion for the web. Trying to fit all that saturation into a 8 bit sRGB color space is more then the file can handle would be interested in knowing if you can see them in the original file.

Hi Don, to see anything at all in the original RAW I have to move the screen in various directions and then "maybe". In the PSD it is now barely visible, and yes it becomes significantly more visible in the JPEG.

When I have the time I am going to use my clone tool and wipe out the banding completely (if I can)! The barely visible banding follows the curvature of the rising sun and the transition from dark to lighter sky.

[Don Lacy]

When I have the time I am going to use my clone tool and wipe out the banding completely (if I can)! The barely visible banding follows the curvature of the rising sun and the transition from dark to lighter sky.
You will not be able to clone it out it is caused by over processing the image here is a link that describes what is happening
http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/posterization.htm the only way to fix it is to lower the saturation of the image.
Well you might be able to clone it out but if that does not work you will have to lower the saturation I think the image looks over cooked as is and you should still have a wonderful image if you lower the saturation .

[Andrew McLachlan]

Hi Jay, late to the party, but love this one. Agree with Don on desaturating a smidge. Can't help with the banding, but it appears a little better in the final repost.