It’s been several months since I tried my hand at anything ICM. I went out yesterday morning for a walkabout in my neighborhood and came upon a favorite grove of trees in a field in a local park. Tried some ICM to see what I could get.
Specific Feedback and Self-Critique
This is a simplified crop, focusing on a small cluster of trees coming up out of the grasses. Out of the camera, the colors were way too Northwest green, so I dialed them back considerably. I also dialed back the highlights as the trunks were too bright. Cropped and some basic adjustments.
Wonderful! I’m happy to see you got back to ICM! I think this one shouts that you need to do it more often, for our viewing pleasure. I love how the grasses provide a base for the trunks to emerge from, and how that blends with the BG. There is a lovely subtlety to the curves in the trunks! No suggestions!
Ditto to what Diane wrote! Great to see an ICM post from you AND thanks for posting a beauty!
What strikes me right away is the power if a single trunk, well, ok, two, but they are paired nicely. Almost like a parent and a child (just thought of that for some reason…) And I like how the greens pretty much encase the trees and create a very lovely color separation.
I know this is somewhat irrelevant… but for me I appreciate that you’ve taken great care to clone out any little dust spots or little anomolies - tells me you took time and care in preparing this gem. Or… maybe you didn’t and we’re just luck the dusties didn’t show up. LOL.
Seriously, I’m thuroughly enjoying this one. I’m not sure what it is, but I’m really drawn to the square crop with these motion abstracts.
Ditto to what was said before, however, I will add that I really like the combination of colors. The green goes really well with the light gray and the maroon. I really enjoy this image!
Hi David,
I agree with all the others, that looks fantastic.
I never tried ICM, except for some long exposures panning with waves at a beach. But images like yours inspire me to give it a try.
Thank you for the reply. I thought maybe you did. Could you share how you came up with the most pleasing colors. I have been wanting to do that with some of my images.
Willem
David, glad you were able to back to experimenting and playing with ICM. This is a wonderful result. I like the square crop, the muted colors, and the vertical lines. I see a bit of magenta color cast on the left most tree trunk. Exposure looks good. Nice work David!
