Jimmy Newells inlet

[Don Railton]

Hi Guys

Another from my trip down south. Same morning as the last only a lot earlier and in worst light arguably... Jimmy Newell was a local convict who died in 1855. After serving his time he use to fish in the area, this inlet provided shelter for him during bad weather.

1D4 & 18mm Zeiss distagon on a tripod, sitting in a stiff breeze.
1/20 sec @ F14, ISO 160.
ACR for basic levels, then CS6 for a bit of Detail extraction in the clouds, a few points added to the vibrancy in the greenery and NIK sharpening.

DON

[dankearl]

Don, you have a good eye for Landscapes and are a very good critique person.
You really need to spend a bit more time on PP though, IMO, this and others you post look very flat.
Punch them up, this is the digital age....
You should spend some time on sites like 500px and others.
This again is very quick and dirty, halos, etc., but even in bad light (and it was), there is a lot more you can do, IMO, in processing than you do....

_D4_9653-copy.jpg

[Don Railton]

Hi Dan, thanks for the nice comments, but especially thank you for showing me and others what can be done. Your RP is a big improvement over my post and it does not look 'over done'... I am naturally a conservative person and always question myself how far i should push the processing, while you look like you could 'make honey out of dog sh_t' to quote a wonderful piece of Australian slang. You have convinced me to try harder/ push further although I always want my photographs to 'keep it real'. That does not always apply to images on some of the sites you mention, but I am going to take your advice and take another look anyway...I think I need to re-calibrate myself...

best regards

DON

[Diane Miller]

Images come into raw converters with low contrast in order to preserve tonal detail at the ends of the histogram (assuming we don't do some sort of auto adjust on import). As we begin to do tonal adjustments, the result often looks like so much improvement that we may stop too soon. A good piece of advice is to push things further and then back off.

Of course, that's in the raw converter, where adjustments are non-destructive. If you go too far and take that image into PS, you can't back off of contrast there without flattening tones. You can back off of adjustment layers in PS, which are non-destructive.

It's also good to compare an age to earlier ones you liked and you may see that it could go further. The histogram is a wonderful reality check.

[dankearl]

Diane,
Not sure what your work process is, but I open ACR, do basic adjustments and open in PS6.
I can go back and open the ACR file as much as I want and open and process the file again and again in every
different way I want to. I am not sure what you are referring to?
Once I have processed a file in PS6 and I don't like it, I just open the ACR file and start again.
Pretty simple, I think you are confusing people.
There is nothing that is ruined by processing in PS6, I think you are giving the wrong info, (or confusing info) to people here.....

[Diane Miller]

Sorry you don't understand, but nothing I said should be confusing.

[dankearl]

Actually I think what you do talk about is confusing to most people.
There is nothing 'destructive " about working in Photoshop.
Nothing.....
You can work on the same photo a million times...
You either are not working in the same software I am, or you are just misinforming people.
Sorry, I have no idea what you are talking about.
I open a photo in ACR.
I make adjustments.
I open in PS6.
I work on it.
I don't like it.
I open it in ACR.
I open it again in PS6.
I work on it......
Again and again and again....

[Don Railton]

Hi Dan & Diane. I do use the workflow Dan has described in Pane 5, and will sometimes restart processing on a file from ACR after walking away for a while. I think what Diane is saying is once an image is in PS and you push an exposure past the boundaries (into clipping or blocking ) then that image has lost data that's gone and not retrievable if the image is flattened & saved.. that's all pretty simple & straight forward, and I do try and do as much as I can in ACR. What I need to do more off is to walk away more and then judge the image for impact/ over processing on my return. If I don't think its looks overdone then keep going until I do, then back it off a bit... then the image is at its optimum and ready to seek others opinions. I also agree with Diane in that the improvements I make in ACR lift the image enough for me to think is 'about right' to post when I really should be doing the walk away and reassess before posting...

Thank you both for your input, I respect both your comments greatly and appreciate your effort to improve my photography.

best regards

Don

[Morkel Erasmus]

I quite like the scene here, Don, and the repost by Dan has addressed my initial thoughts of it looking flat and lacking some punch.
I agree that in theory PS processing is "destructive" but I've yet to see it play out in real world terms when working with a high res file and being careful with the application of effects.
I also agree that it's easier these days for me to reprocess entirely than to save too many layered gigabytes of tiff files for fear of one day having to redo the file.

[Diane Miller]

I DID NOT say processing in PS is destructive but I won't bother to explain further. There is a wonderful amount of power and flexibility in raw processing and PS but it is easier to stick with what is easy to teach.

[dankearl]

Actually you have said it on numerous occasions.
It is very misleading, especially for beginners and you are a moderator for them...
Post processing is a must, but it is does not require a PHD.
People should be encouraged to experiment and become proficient in post processing.
To constantly suggest as you do, that somehow it is "destructive" is bad advice for beginners.
One can process an image a million times, just start over with the Raw file.
It is not brain surgery.....

[Morkel Erasmus]

Dan, Diane, let's park this now. :)
Any comments pertaining to the image are welcome...

[Don Lacy]

Sorry late to this one, first the image, as Dan pointed out Don you have a wonderful eye for composition but you really should look into improving your PS skills I think you will enjoy the process of brining your image to life. If you would like some help please feel free to PM me I would gladly walk you through processing an image. As for the PS discussion there are to types of workflows one is considered non destructive because all adjustments are made on layers and do not effect the pixels of the image. This gives you great flexibility as you can edit or remove any adjustment at any time and selectively apply them with mask. A destructive workflow is when you make adjustment to the actual image or background layer these adjustments change the actual pixels of the image and once done can not be reversed so if you mess up a adjustment you have to start over with a whole new image from the raw file which is not an effective way to work. The terms destructive and non destructive workflow are used and talked about in every book and video I have ever seen on processing with no one ever recommending working with a destructive workflow. Hope that clears that up.

[Andrew McLachlan]

Hi Don, another nicely composed scene and Dan's repost does make a big improvement and gives the impact it needs.