This is one of a series of shots I took of the side of our barn early one morning. The textured wood naturally made a perfect subject for monochrome. Is it all right that the boards are angled slightly or would you prefer to see them straight? Any C&C are welcome!
Olympus SP-550 UZ
f4.5 @ 1/320, ISO 100, -0.7 EV
Program mode, pattern metering, sunny WB
Processed in PS CS2; cropped, curves adjustment,and shadow/highlight
Converted to monochrome using channel mixer, gradient map, curves, and hue/saturation for sepia tone
Christopher, This has a very natural feel to it. I like that the boards aren't straight-it gives them some perspective. The sepia tone is nice. The strapping (I'm guessing that's what it is) is placed well in the frame.Nicely done!
Christopher, I think you did a great job at "seeing" this image. I don't mind the lines of the boards going a bit at an angle - it kind of adds a little more interest, actually. I do think for a more natural look you might pull back the saturation just a bit and move to more of a brown tint - it almost has a bit of a red undertone here.
Christopher, now that I'm looking at your image with the sun down I think I prefer your post! Mine seems to be a bit on the yellow side so maybe somewhere between the two would be best.
All I did was open your image in CS4 and click on the black and white conversion layer in order to take the image back to "neutral." There is a box on that layer that you can check to add a tint so I checked it and played around with the pop up color picker until I found something a little more brown (or so I thought in the light of day!) The only other thing I did (if I remember this right) was to bring the midtones up just a touch using a levels adjustment. Pretty simple, actually.
Hey Chris,
Really like the comp and the way you brought out the texture of the wood in the re-post. I just lightened the old saw blade???....using a screen blend layer....to bring out the details in it a hair more. You can adjust the opacity to taste.....but this is just to give you another idea. Let me know your thoughts.
Thanks Roman for the suggestion! I think it does make it look a little better.
BTW it's not an old saw blade, it's one of a number of old metal strips nailed along the sides of the barn. What their purpose is I don't know. What look like the teeth of a saw are actually shadows on the wood.
Hi Christopher,
I like the composition and image...I too like the texture in the wood...the rusty blade adds a nice touch to it...Roman's repost puts it over the top...congrats...:cool:
Knots and Nails
