GBH Watercolor

[Bill Dix]

I shot this in poor light as a silhouette, but when I got it home I didn't much like the result. So before trashing it I decided to experiment a bit. Added + 3.3 stops in RAW transfer, and applied a Watercolor filter in an attempt to make the troublesome noise into an artistic texture. Let me know what you think.

D90 | 80-400 @ 370mm | ISO 640 | 1/2500s @ f/7.1 | -0.7 EV as shot, added + 3.3 | HH

[Melissa Groo]

I think that's absolutely beautiful, Bill! Nice save!

[Julie Kenward]

That is a nice save, Bill! Might consider darkening the bright end of the perch but everything else is terrific. I'm going to copy this down to the OOTB forum so they can see it as well.

[Rob Miner]

Hey Bill,

You give me hope. Great picture - planned or not.

Rob...............

[Gus Hallgren]

Hi Bill;

Like your save, looks great. If mine, I would remove vertical piece of perch.

Well done, Young Man, you created a masterpiece.

Gus

[Brian Kent]

Beautiful save Bill! If you don't mind my asking, what did you use for your Watercolor filter, i.e. what product?
Thanks!
Brian

[Bill Dix]

Thank you all for the comments. Jules, I did darken the bright end of the perch, and the bright spot on the leg, and it looks better. (In my master file I have also selected a white point to fix the blue tint in the image as posted.) Brian, the Watercolor filter is one of 15 options in the Artistic Filter palette in PS Elements (Filter/Artistic/Watercolor). You really need to blow the TIFF image up to full size (11 x 17) to see the full watercolor effect, which is not totally apparent in the web-sized jpeg.