What technical feedback would you like if any? Any. I have included the before and after. I don’t know how to use luminosity masks which would be helpful in this photo. I tried getting rid of the bright spots. Any suggestions welcome. Did I make the grass too green? Please be honest. Also, I wasn’t sure if this belongs in landscapes or another category. Thanks for your patience!!
What artistic feedback would you like if any? Any
Pertinent technical details or techniques: Fuji XT2, ISO 200, f13, 1/170 post in LR, PS & Topaz
(If this is a composite, etc. please be honest with your techniques to help others learn)
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@RobertaKayne
I was so entranced by this scene in the After photo, the first thing I did was to look up Custer Valley State Park. This inviting image could be in its brochure. The eye flows from the horses, down the stream, and for me, back to the foreground point to do it all over again.
I like what you did with the shadows.
I expect some would suggest cropping from the bottom and right; the image would still tell the story, but with less of the flat water on lower left to dilute the story.
It looks like the blues (sky and clouds) became more saturated in your After image. Blue, particularly bright sky blue is a color that demands attention. So the eye following up the river gets stuck in the sky and is less likely to come back into the image. It looks a bit unrealistic. Desaturating blues also reduces the blue in the stream; I liked most of the blue in the stream, so I partially masked the Hue/Saturation blue desaturation out of that part of the image.
I got started with Luminosity masks with the free “Basic” RapidMask (also known as TK6) from Tony Kruyper. He has lots of documentation, although much of that is for the TK7 upgrade ( best $30 you might spend)
Roberta,
Wow, what an outstanding job you did with transforming this image. Very impressive. Oh, and this is a beautiful scene and primarily nature so no worries posting here.
I do like Dick’s rendition, but I think yours stands out nicely as presented. I do agree the blue sky is just slightly too blue - but then again I think Dick took too much away (and more green now) But in either case, both are well within the realm of personal choice.
I do really like how you’ve brought out the blue sky reflecting in the stream.
Oh, and what a great job cloning out the drive on the right. I had to take a second and third look. My only suggestion there would be to clean up one area. In the cloned area that contains the water, the bottom-most area near the right edge, the “ripples” are repeated from above (the clone source.) It’s not that the patter repeats that I mention, but the fact that there wouldn’t be rippling little rapids right next to the shore like that. Not sure if I’m making sense, and pretty nitpicky at that.
The greens and overall processing look great to me. Oh, and one last tip. When posting two version like you have, you might want to just edit your original post and include both images. That way viewers can actually cycle through both images for easy comparisons. No biggie, but thought I would mention.
thanks for sharing!
Lon
Fabulous photo. My two cents worth: the original sky is definetly too blue, and the greens slightly too green. Both corrected versions work better. Regarding a possible crop, my vote is no. The rocks and grass in the lower right perfectly balance the horses on the left and create a stronger leading line up the stream.
@Dick_Knudson, @Lon_Overacker and @Tony_Siciliano Thank you so much for your great and detailed feedback about my photo! This community is amazing, and I really appreciate your input, comments and critiques. I will make the corrections, like desaturating the blue in the sky a bit. and desaturating the green grass. I’m still very new to this community, and this is my 3rd post, so I’m still learning.
@Dick_Knudson, thanks for the info on TK6. I have one of the TK panels that I use for sharpening a photo for web but haven’t learned more about it.
@Lon_Overacker I truly appreciate your kind comments! I will work on taking out the ripples, if I can do it. And thanks for the heads up about posting the before and after together. As I said, I’m new, so I wasn’t sure how to do it.
@Tony_Siciliano Thanks for your comments on the colors and the crop. I appreciate it!
