Rusted Kettle

[Dennis Bishop]

This was the inside of a huge old cast iron kettle outside the Waterford Oaks County Park barn. It used to hold drinking water for cattle. The rust pattern is quite unusual.

3-exposure HDR at 1 EV intervals
Nikon D3s, ISO 200, f/8, 105mm macro lens

post-processing

• Photomatix -- tone mapping for a good histogram
• Nik Silver Efex Pro -- conversion to black & white with restoration of some of the light orange rust color
• Some of the orange was replaced in a duplicate layer with a light/medium blue and applied with the Darken blend mode. (The net effect was to tone down the orange.)
• Fractalius -- Glow 100 with Luminosity blend mode
• Nik Color Efex Pro -- Darken/Lighten Center, with effect positioned in upper left corner
• Topaz Simplify -- Watercolor II, applied with Luminosity blend mode at reduced opacity
• duplicate layer of Darken Lighten Center with Darken blend mode
• Photo Filter adjustment layer (cyan)
• Fractalius -- a total of four b&w layers with Multiply blend mode, two different presets based on Sketch with duplicate copies of each
• Alien Skin Snap Art -- Stylize Line Art preset with Divide blend mode to add white lines
• gradient vignette

[Paul Lagasi]

Very nice pattern and colors, love the texture..well done

[denise ippolito]

Love the pattern, texture and softened color tones. This would look lovely as a large print. I also like the idea of bringing some of the metallic colors up. Just another view for an already great image. Good eye for this one.

[Maureen Allen]

Very nice. I don't know what it is about rust exactly, but the combination of textures and colors always seems to make such interesting images. I like Denise's repost with the boost in color.

[Cheryl Slechta]

Dennis, I love rust! This is really nice and I like Denise's repost as well - for the color boost but also the boost in the squiggly black lines.

[Dennis Bishop]

I like it, too. Thanks, Denise.

[Dave Woeller]

When I first saw the thumbnail, I thought of an arial view of a corral reef. The colors are fantastic. It's always nice to come across a found image like this. It's even better to see a result in your mind and capture it. A wonderful capture and presentation.

[Judy Howle]

I like the colors and unusual patterns and the processing works well. I like the added color and detail in Denise's version.

[Indranil Sircar]

Dennis, this is excellent! Great way to look at ordinary things... I like your processing and bringing up some more of the metallic color enhanced it further.

[John Storjohann]

Dennis, your technical prowess in bringing out the "hidden image" is always impressive...a lesson to all of us in conceptualization and processing. I like the organic feel to this image...something I find myself more and more drawn to in some of my own work...and I like the extra textural feel that Denise's repost brought out. I hope to see more from you along these lines...well done!