So I’m going thru a fase that I think I’m over editing my images just to give that punch, and not working them on the field, maybe because I learned to shot on film and editing was not that easy.
Now I see some images I did and processed and I think I crossed the line.
I sort of agree with Harley. There is so much more definition in the second but the land is too contrasts. It would be challenging to get this just right. B just looks over processed. Overall I prefer the original.
I agree with Harley. I like the sky in the second better. The increased definition and contrast works for me. But the land in the second looks over processed and unreal, partly because the land is so much brighter than the sky. The top and bottom of the photo just don’t match light-wise. One sees this “land brighter than the sky” often on photos posted all over the net, but under most circumstances, it is imposssible and my reaction is always “where is this light coming from”? That being said, I would experiment with giving the bottom some pop, but much less than #2.
You guys confirmed my “fear”. I’ll have to make some changes on the editing. I can totally relate with Tony’,s on the land brighter than the sky images, and I did it here without even noticing. And indeed it’s not appealing at all, I think the net it’s full of it because people like to see images that can’t see with the make eye, but to much is just to much. I’ll have to dial down, I’ll try to do some work on this image and then repost.
El Greco’s classic View of Toledo has a sky darker than the land. Painters often use a dark sky for dramatic effect. How close to reality do you feel you should be?
@Igor_Doncov more and more i think I should keep the images as close to reality as possible, I like shooting nature to share the experience I had when hiking or exploring, and I feel that exaggerating on the PP will lie about the experience I had.
@João_Ferrão I agree that the second image looks too over-processed. The weather here looks like a misty, foggy day, with nice soft light. The contrast in the second image just seems too harsh to be consistent with this type of light/weather. Especially the shadows are too dark and contrasty for this type of light. This type of of soft light in foggy conditions can help create painterly looking images, and I think your first image has that painterly look.
I would want to maintain the softer look and feeling. I am presenting a rework I think you could enhance the first image by emphasizing the warm highlights in the landscape. I used luminosity masks to dodge the highlights, painting with a yellow/orange color rather than white. I slightly increased contrast in the sky, and added a vignette in the upper corners to emphasize the light at the top of the ridge. When you have nice soft light like you have here, sometimes you only need to make subtle tweaks.
@Ed_McGuirk thanks for the time making the rework. Indeed it looks much more like what I saw. Indeed is the way I’ll have to process the images. Do you still have the PS file?
Joao, I would definitely go with the first option. I think Ed’s rework has elevated it even more. However, I would consider going with the sky in the second image if I am going B&W on this image or perhaps halfway between that and what Ed presented here.
@Adhika_Lie thanks for the feedback. I tried b/w but I didn’t liked it so much. I do like the colours of the image. The b/w version was a bit “soulless” to me.
@João_Ferrão unfortunately I did not save the rework with layers intact, but here is a more detailed description of my edits. I used TK Actions luminosity Masks to make the edits. I made a Lights 2 selection, and painted on a TK dodge layer to brighten the highlights in the land (but not the sky). Instead of painting with the standard white brush, I used the color picker to select the warm yellow color in the lower right corner, and painted over the entire landscape with that. This brightens and warms the lighter tones in the landscape.
For the sky I made a Midtones 1 selection, placed it on a curves adjustment layer, and set the blending mode to Soft Light. This added some midtone contrast to the sky, and then I placed this AL in a group, and masked it away from the landscape, leaving the midtone contrast adjustment only in the sky. I then added some vignetting in the two upper corners
@Ed_McGuirk thanks so much for the detailed description. I will try to redo based on your description, especially that technique with the color picker brush (it’s new for me and it’s very interesting).
Again thanks so much.
Cheers
I agree with you. I believe that digital postprocessing has left photography by now. Photography was always a medium to ‘capture’ a scene rather than create it. The current direction is for altering images to ‘what I saw’ which the camera wasn’t able to record. Photography now is somewhere between creative art and photography but neither one. It’s become so popular because it does not require the skill of art. It’s a big subject. There is more to say.
I don’t think it doesn’t require sill of art, on the contrary. I do think that nowadays the electronic automations and algorithms are so advance that emulate the work and knowledge required some years ago.
On the PP part I think there’s a part of photography that needs PP (besides photojournalism of course) even in film, the shutter speed I will shoot a water fall is a byproduct of the image mood I want to share, maybe a more calm scene with a long shutter or a dynamic one with frozen water, and I think PP on digital and messing with light on PP is a byproduct of that same mood type I want to share. I just think that I was getting pulled to the dark side of it ahah unfortunately as many people are.
But a very saturated image with lots os constrast and unnatural light could be and artistic interpretation of a scene and for me it’s all ok if the it is the final result wanted. Not in my case thou. But yes. It’s a very big subject indeed.
Igor, I’m not sure I understand what you mean by “postprocessing has left photography by now”, would you mind clarifying what you mean by this?
'Photography now is somewhere between creative art and photography but neither one." I agree 100% with this statement, and this hybrid medium has been used for both good and evil
To me the trick is actually knowing how to tastefully enhance an image without it being obvious. That does require at least a little skill, and it also requires some restraint on the part of the person doing the processing. It obviously doesn’t require the same skill set as oil painting etc, but when done well it can add value to images.
Now if you are talking about the masses of the general public slapping Instragram-ready filter presets on cell phone pictures, that’s a different story, I agree there’s often not much skill or creativity involved there.
