This is from Joshua Tree NP this weekend. The wildflowers are really getting into the swing of things near the southern border.
No crop, adjusted Levels, tweaked Curves, pumped Selective Colors and sharpened with USM after resizing. I feel there's more potential but not sure where or how to bring it out. Didn't want to pump up the colors any more or the blue desert lupines will start turning purple. The sky is flat but it was within 15 minutes of sunset so I don't want to make it medium blue.
Also, at this size & compression, a lot of detail is lost in the distant wildflowers. Bottom line, how can I make it look better for the Web? Thanks.
Canon 10D, 17-40L at 17mm, 1/50", f/16, ISO 100, +1.3 EC
Last edited by LeeOtsubo; 03-03-2008 at 12:51 PM.
Reason: Added Exif data
hi lee, you've got a beautiful scene here. as far as making it look better for the web, i wished i could help but i am having some trouble in that department myself.
as far as you picture goes, you can select the sky and darken it a little and it will actually pop some cloud streaks out. i did it in capture nx and it looked great. then you can select the foreground and brghtnen it a bit. really makes the flowers look good.
if you could post some exif data, some others might could comment on what to do so you maybe wouldnt lose the detail in the distant flowers.
like you said, you dont need to boost the colors, just some light adjustments in certain areas. the mountains look perfectly exposed on my monitor, so i wouldnt mess with them at all.
i would post my version, but when i mess with it, the file size gets larger and i dont know how to compress it without making the picture itself smaller.
Lee I tried making some changes converting to LAB color to enhance but leave color balance as presented Also lighten just a tad for the mountains The thing that is odd to me is the green color? The overall feel and texture doesn't feel right Hard to explain
Let me know what you think of the re post Just a subtle change btw You did very well with the in camera framing
Thanks guys,
Alfred's version is getting closer to where I want to be. The actual scene was much darker because of the time so I'm trying to reconcile what I saw versus what I want to show. I think this is the artistic side that I haven't yet grasped.
I know what you mean about the green tone. I suspect it's because of the bush on the left side that has green bark at this time of year. The name escapes me but it's very noticeable.
Harold, I tried selecting the sky and setting blend mode to Multiply but couldn't get it to look natural.
I'm glad Alfred noticed that it's full frame. I always try to compose in the VF but it doesn't always work. I feel that if I can't compose a static landscape in-camera, what chance do I have of composing a BIF in camera?
As always, I really appreciate the well considered and insightful feedback here.
I tried a different take. I did a levels correction and set the white point, black point and gray points using the eye droppers. I then brightened it some using the mid-tone slider. Than on the BG Copy, I did a Shadow Highlights and at 25% amount of each slide the shadows up to open up the FG and highlights up to tone down the clouds.
Harold & Robert,
Thanks! This is great, it's very close to what I was trying to achieve. Yes, Harold, I'd like to know what steps you used. And, Robert, thanks for listing all your steps. PS reminds me of the old joke, "The good news is... and the bad news is..." It's so powerful and has so many tools that I forget about tools from time to time. This time, I forgot about S&H. Old age and senior moments suck!
Purple Mountain Majesties
