Lucked into this one, what could be improved.

drdan · May 3, 2004

I took this Satuday and had to do very little with it. It just seemed to come together and I like it. I'm not really sure exactly why it works and I'm not sure where to go to get the most out of it.

c0ntr0lz · May 3, 2004

it fells a bit left heavy
and a bit bright

drdan · May 4, 2004

Any suggestions on the "left heavy". I was thinking of cloning out part or all of the big oakbrush on the left.. Cropping on the left seems to make the angles not look as good.

There is so much shadow on the rocks already that it doesn't seem to work well to decrease overall brightness. What about decreasing brightness of just of the sky?

canonrebel · May 4, 2004

drdan, you've done it once again! You are so lucky to find these places.

My suggestions would be (and they wouldn't necessarily be an improvement).....

Select the sky and exclude it from the process of opening up the foreground shrubs, opening up the tree that frames the left border, and opening up the shadows.

IMHO, I would want more detail and contrast in the big tree, the foreground shrubs, and the trees at the base of the white rock.

These modifications, as you already know, would be a walk-in-park for PhotoShop CS V8.

Rebel

metroshane · May 4, 2004

burn in the clouds.

drdan · May 5, 2004

I do have PS8 but I don't know much about using it.

Specifically I don't know what open up the tree means or how to get more detail in the rocks. I also have no idea what "burn in" the clouds means.

metroshane · May 5, 2004

I do have PS8 but I don't know much about using it.

When all else fails, read the instructions.

drdan · May 5, 2004

I am trying to learn one or two things at a time but I've found the help section to be extremely unhelpful on certain subjects unless you already know a lot about photoshop. There is a reason all those paid courses in photoshop exist. From what I can see there needs to be a course in understanding the photoshop help section.

drdan · May 5, 2004

Okay, apparently PS has a burn tool and burn means darken. I tried the tool on the sky and it does look better.

What I tried instead though which seemed more consistent although probably less flexible was to select the sky with the lasso tool, feather the edges so there was no abrupt change and decrease brightness, increase constrast and color saturation slightly. Then I inverted the selection and increased brightness and contrast in the rest of the picture.

Is this moving toward what you were talking about?

metroshane · May 5, 2004

Aboslutely. congratulations...it already looks better. And remember there is no one single way to do anything.

canonrebel · May 5, 2004

drdan said:
Specifically I don't know what open up the tree means or how to get more detail in the rocks. I also have no idea what "burn in" the clouds means.

Open up the tree means to increase the light levels so as to allow more detail information. "Burn in" means to DECREASE the light levels.

But as I've mentioned earlier, it's a beautiful shot just the way it is.

canonrebel · May 5, 2004

drdan, here's an exagurated example of "opening up to allow more detail". You're going to like PS CS v8....

Of course, when you change one element in a photo, the relationship of the elements to each other changes. In this rendition of your shot, I've managed to keep the viewer's focus out of the sky and redirected it to the rest of the photo. But as the photo is now, the foreground shrubry steels too much attention from the big white rock. Maybe the big white rock could be opened up a little more in order to command more of the viewer's attention. Possibilities for your photo is limited only by your imagination. Your original shot is a strong photo as it appeared in the beginning of this post. Changes do not necessarily make it better--just different.

The wonderful thing about PhotoShop is that it allows one to explore many different creative avenues.

drdan · May 6, 2004

Thanks to both of you, that is exactly the kind of advice I need.

Harpper · May 6, 2004

The others have pretty much said it all. Bringing out the clouds is definitely what's needed. Although sometimes I find it better to retake the shot because if the picture is too blown out either over or under exposed then fixing it in Photoshop adds too much digital noise for my liking. Drdan, you can see it a little bit in your second picture and I can definitely see more of it in cannonrebel's edited picture. It just depends on how picky you want to be.

It is possible to fix these problems without noise, but from my experience, it requires a lot more work. It's usually more enjoyable for me to retake the picture anyway.

Nytmair · May 6, 2004

canonrebel said:
drdan, here's an exagurated example of "opening up to allow more detail". You're going to like PS CS v8....

Of course, when you change one element in a photo, the relationship of the elements to each other changes. In this rendition of your shot, I've managed to keep the viewer's focus out of the sky and redirected it to the rest of the photo. But as the photo is now, the foreground shrubry steels too much attention from the big white rock. Maybe the big white rock could be opened up a little more in order to command more of the viewer's attention. Possibilities for your photo is limited only by your imagination. Your original shot is a strong photo as it appeared in the beginning of this post. Changes do not necessarily make it better--just different.

The wonderful thing about PhotoShop is that it allows one to explore many different creative avenues.

how did you brighten up the rocks and shrubs so drastically? what took does that? thanks

and darkening the clouds/brightening the rocks DEFINAETLY improved this photo. nice shot