Shot this early one cloudy and drizzly morning a little after what would have been sunrise. The white balance was kinda funky as was the color balance. I’m not very pleased with the distant mountains and would love to hear your suggestions there as well as on the entire image.
Shot in Cades Cove in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
Nice scene full of color, texture, and activity. I could see pulling down the brightness of the mountains and sky a bit, but there is a sense of distance and depth in keeping them a bit lighter than the foreground.
Bill, I really like what is going on in the foreground. The color and contrast there look nice. The composition is well seen.
I am unsure what is going on with the far background and sky. There looks to be too much yellow in the clouds, and magenta and cyan in the far mountains.
You could do as Tony suggests; darkening the mountains and sky a bit.
Perhaps others can chime in regarding your issue with color balance.
–P
Bill, what a wonderful Smokies moment with the deer in the landscape at Cades Cove. Your composition has a nice balance in the distribution of the trees as well. I agree with the other’s comments about darkening the sky. Also in terms of color balance, i think there is too much of a magenta cast in this image. Attached is a rework with sky darkened, and a Photoshop Color Balance adjustment layer with +20 Green (reduce Magenta).
Thanks Ed for your comments and for the re-work. I think the distant mountains look much better, but the FG greens now look a little strong. I think I’ll go back and selectively boost the greens in the mountains while while the FG greens as they were. Thanks again for your help and suggestions!
Lovely, pastoral autumn scene. I especially like the grazing deer to add interest in the green field.
Definitely something funky going on with the colors in the bg. Too blue to my eye. Plenty of ways to address the color. Difficult in the download version since all the pixels aren’t there and color/sat clip or get wonky quickly. So, not sure if this is any better, but gave it a shot.
Basically I used 3 layers. 1 Selective color to bump yellow in the neutrals; reducing the blue. 2 generic hue/sat layer to drop the blue and magenta and then 3. a midtones luminosity Levels layer to boost the contrast a bit and also dropped the blue channel slightly. Also, each one of these I painted out the changes on each of these layers for tasted; for example, the keep the green grass as original as possible. I typically target areas for change and use a soft brush at varying opacities to accomplish it (on a mask).
Anyway, here’s a quick and dirty alternative. Color/Sat is of course always subjective and personal.
Thanks Lon. I like Ed’s re-work, but I think yours might be a wee bit better. I will do a re-work when I have time and hopefully correct the problems. Thanks for your help!
