Oversharpened bear?

[Stan Cunningham]

I was shooting landscapes in front of the campground at Brooks, and was surprised by a bear that wanted me to get out of the way.
Fortunately I was able to get a shot, but didn't think that my slower shutter speed was now a problem. I ran a couple of contrast masks, and may have over done it. The jpeg looks more so than the tiff though, maybe when I sharpened it again for the web. Unfortunately I know less about landscapes than wildlife photography so any comments to improve the image are always appreciated.
Canon 5D II, 17 - 40 L, ISO 320 F22, 1/40 sec, - 1.0 exp.
I used Curves in LAB mode to bring out sky color and cropped it slightly. Beautiful way to spend the evening, even with the mosquitoes.

[Hilary Hann]

Stan, beautiful composition … very striking. I don't find the bear problematic at all, although at this size it is hard to judge. More distracting is the blown hole in the sky. I think the colour of the sky you extracted is lovely, just wish for a little more detail in that centre patch as it draws the eye to it, but nothing is there. I think you've done an excellent job with this image.

[Steve Kaluski]

I really like the setting on this one Stan and it makes for a good environment/habitat image.

What I might suggest is you let the bear go into shadow (silhouette) so it is black and add some more canvas at the foot of the image as it's just too tight. Both bear and foreground is black. By doing this you avoid the issue of sharpness & trying to retrieve detail and IMHO it looks more natural. At presented (the bear) does look over sharp as there are a lot of artifacts visible too.

Stan, next time I would take full advantage of posting your image at the maximum size allowed here, as it offers better options for the reader and the feedback perhaps can also be more detailed as the re is more to see.

TFS
Steve

[Rachel Hollander]

Hi Stan - was on that beach last year myself and also had bears interupt my trying to shoot a couple landscapes. I like the comp(although it is tight on the bottom) but agree with Hilary that the blown sky is more problematic for me than the bear. Some good suggestions by Steve for trying to deal with the issues.

TFS,
Rachel

[jack williamson]

Good suggestions by all above Stan. I really like this, really like the mood it conveys. There are several dust spots from your sensor on the image.

Jack

[Stan Cunningham]

As always, thanks for your many comments as they greatly improved the image.
I will go over each comment and what I did to fix it. First, Hilary and Rachel, the clipped highlights was my doing on the computer with curves and I really didn't notice. So when I went back to the original raw it was not bad, and I tried to improve it by running a mask on the highlights with a multiply blend at 50%. It brought out some more colors, obviously nothing I can do about a cloud not being there. But good comment and I hope you think it looks better.
Second Steve, I now have no crop on the image, and added canvas at the bottom. For the silhouette I selected the bear and beach and used levels to darken it. I didn't go all the way black as it looked unnatural to me. I also resaved it in the largest possible (1024 by and 200 kb). I had created an action based on a post here from a couple years back when the size recommended was half that. Thanks.
Last, thanks Jack, I'm embarrassed I didn't notice those. But it wasn't dust, but mosquito's but it looks like they are all gone now. I had a beautiful image I'll never be able to use because a mosquito had landed on the lens, too much to remove.
I think this covers your suggestions, if you think I over did PLEASE say. I'm really new to any thing in photoshop above a basic clone and obviously I don't notice many things as I'm still trying to develop a critical eye.
Stan

[Hilary Hann]

Stan, absolutely first class job on that sky. No problems with this image for me at all now. Lovely environmental photograph of the bear, just where it should be. :S3:

[Steve Canuel]

Repost is excellent Stan. This one has great feel.

[Tommy Rodgers]

I like the repost. The difference between the original and repost are astonishing. There is also a Photoshop lesson in your explanations. Thanks, I needed that. Just goes to show what can be learn from just one photo. Thanks for sharing.

[Robert Amoruso]

Stan,

I like the sky in post 2 and the FG and brighter water in post 1.

Landscape composition-wise, I think I would have preferred you to pan right and gotten the bear against the brighter part of the water.

[Grant Atkinson]

Very beautiful image you have taken Stan, and the repost is excellent. I like it as is...well done