I spent a lot of the summer of 2018 traveling the western states, dodging fires all the way. I thought the first day I camped in Glacier NP, I’d beaten the smoke, but alas, they too began to have fires. However, it made for some interesting morning colors.
All comments welcome.
Is this a composite: No
D500, 17-35 @24mm, f/11, 1/200, ISO 100
50/50 ACR/PS with one each lights and darks mask with a mid tone mask for some color balance.
What a gorgeous meadow to wake up next to. Nice, orange sky…unfortunate the cause. Did you smell smoke at this location?
Yes. It was quite prevalent throughout the park and really beyond up into Canada where they too were having fires. I smelled smoke all the way to the eastern slopes of the Cascades on my way to WA state.
You know sometimes the smoke really accentuates the image, as it does here. Most of the time, for me, I tend to switch to B&W to mimic fog. This one really works in color.
Hi Chris,
Nice scene here and I like the soft light and the shapes of the peaks. There is a bit of a green/cyan colour cast here I personally would neutralise this cast which will give an orange to magenta palette in the sky and a colour contrast to the foreground grass.
Hi, Nathan. I see the color cast though on my monitor, it’s not so aggressive. However, I did neutralize some of it, but toned down the magenta and recovered the nice highlights in the trees in the mid-ground area.
The smoke has done some great things to soften the sky here, and if nothing else it allowed you to shoot into the sun without getting flare. I agree with @Nathan_Klein that the original presentation had a green color cast. Color is very subjective, but I prefer the colors in your rework over what Nathan did. Given how warm the sky is in your rework, I think I would also prefer to see a bit more warmth in the foregrond grass as well. Here is a rework dong that, starting from your rework. While greens in shadow are cool toned in real life, I think you could get away with slightly more foreground warmth.
What was your process for warming the meadow?
Photoshop Photo Filter adjustment layer, set to warming at 100% opacity. Then on the layer mask of the adjustment layer, I used a gradient to mask it into just the foreground.
Thanks! It’s what I would have done…nice to know I am thinking correctly.
Hi Chris,
Although colour is subjective I do think that warmer colours instead of green/cyan make more sense to most folks for a sunrise/sunset. I think you’ve now got a nice balance between warm and cool colours.
