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Thread: Blue Wildebeest in Etosha Storm

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    BPN Member Douglas Bolt's Avatar
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    Default Blue Wildebeest in Etosha Storm

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    Canon 5DM1, 24-105@105, f8, 1/800, ISO 640. PP: PSCC NIK Detail Extraction, Tonal Contrast, then SEP with opacity reduced to 50%. The image looks a bit crunchy to me. I think that may be due to processing it for printing at 9x16" and then deciding to get some input, so I resized to 1200px. The printed version does not look over sharpened, to me at least.

    I'm particularily interested in feedback regarding the effect produced by reducing the opacity of the BW conversion layer to 50%.
    Douglas Bolt
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    Hi Douglas, yes as posted the image looks quite gritty, too contrasty and oversharpened. You need to resize the image for Web first and then apply your sharpening. Otherwise when you sharpen for 9X16" print and then resize the 1200 @ 96, this is what to be expected. I'd suggest you give it another try.

    Regarding the image itself, the color of the sky looks a deep purple to me. Is it what you had in mind? This is a tough crop and you might want to include the out of camera image for folks to see if there is an alternative crop. To me the wildebeest is too centered here, but I can see you want to include the streaks of light on the RHS.

    Loi

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    BPN Member Douglas Bolt's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Loi Nguyen View Post
    Hi Douglas, yes as posted the image looks quite gritty, too contrasty and oversharpened. You need to resize the image for Web first and then apply your sharpening. Otherwise when you sharpen for 9X16" print and then resize the 1200 @ 96, this is what to be expected. I'd suggest you give it another try.

    Regarding the image itself, the color of the sky looks a deep purple to me. Is it what you had in mind? This is a tough crop and you might want to include the out of camera image for folks to see if there is an alternative crop. To me the wildebeest is too centered here, but I can see you want to include the streaks of light on the RHS.

    Loi
    Thanks, Loi.

    Here is the original unprocessed image.
    Douglas Bolt
    DougBoltPhotography.com

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    Lifetime Member Rachel Hollander's Avatar
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    Hi Doug - I'm a believer in less is more when it comes to pp and trying to depict the scene as I saw it. So for me, your op is too amped up and you've introduced CA in the sky. Also if you do use detail extractor, you need to do so very judiciously so as not to look oversharpened and gritty. I understand that you went with the comp you did here because you wanted to capture the streaks in the urc but I agree with Loi that the wilde is too centered, perhaps a crop from the left since it is looking back at you. Sorry if this is too negative, but if you like your op in a print and want to hang it, that's all that really matters.

    TFS,
    Rachel

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    BPN Member Morkel Erasmus's Avatar
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    Doug, a lovely scene, but I echo Rachel above. I do agree you can push this a bit in the sky, though, compared to the second post. I will work a bit with your 2nd version tonight and see what I come up with. As much as I love Nik's filters, the Detail Extractor is a very iffy one, I usually run it very lightly (if I use it at all) and then set the resulting layer's opacity to somewhere between 20-40%. It can give an overly "HDR" effect where the shadows aren't realistically deep enough and highlights are too muted.
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    BPN Member Morkel Erasmus's Avatar
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    Douglas- here's my take. Quick work-up of the 2nd jpg you posted, so would obviously look better if worked from RAW...
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    BPN Member Douglas Bolt's Avatar
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    Thanks Morkel,

    Certainly a more natural look than the OP. I like the sheen on the Wildebeest's coat.
    Douglas Bolt
    DougBoltPhotography.com

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