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Into the sea I fall
Into the sea I fall
Tez


Photograph Information Photographer's Comments
Challenge: Free Study 2009-02 (Advanced Editing VII)
Camera: Canon EOS-40D
Lens: Canon EF 17-40mm f/4.0 L USM
Location: Lake Taupo
Date: Feb 25, 2009
Aperture: 8
ISO: 200
Shutter: 1/800
Galleries: Water, High Dynamic Range (HDR)
Date Uploaded: Feb 13, 2009

 Taken from a single raw. In Lightroom I made 3 exposures- one basic, one overexposed by +2 to bring out the detail in the foreground and the guy, and another set at -4 to attempt to contain the massive blow out in the sky (it didn't work). I exported all 3 into PS and masked in/out the applicable areas to make the image more like what my eyes saw. The image was then flattened to make a single image to work on. Horizon was tilted too as this was taken from the hip.

I suppose in that way it IS an HDR image but only in the literal sense- there was no Photomatix involved.

When I had the file in PS I shifted the colours to warmer hues with color balance and selective colouring. The tone-mapped look was done by 3 applications of Nik Color Efex's Tonal Contrast filter (it's awesome) at different settings. The glow was acheived by using the diffuse glow filter and gaussian blur at different blending modes (most were done on screen or lighten and then masked for specific parts, namely the guy's back, the sky and the reflections in the water).

Dodge/burn on the guy to add dimension to him and some d/b on the water too to provide more depth to it and a bit more of a 3d look.

I pushed the saturation a lot for this one to make it look a bit more surreal. The final touches consisted of using Noiseninja to soften some of the tonal contrast filter's detrimental effects (uber noise/grain in clear areas) and a run of USM on the usual settings of 15/25. I added a tiny border by making a new layer, adding a 6 pixel stroke and blurring it on about 25 pix with gaussian blur.

And lastly, I did a dust & scratches thing after the resize on the guy's torso and left arm at radius 1 and threshold 8 just to smooth out the shadow areas and make it look less noisy and rough. His skin almost looked like it was made of sand which looked cool but incongruous.

I expect this to totally bomb on DPC, but then again, I'm through caring what the scores are on this website. I don't expect another image to be in this challenge that even looks like this and for me, it's quite a departure in terms of style and post-processing so whatever, I learned something whilst doing this...having said that, I expect this to get a 5.6 like all the pics I like do, if this gets over a 6 i'll be surprised- I further expect to have a 7+ score from commentors.

Cheers.

Statistics
Place: 87 out of 436
Avg (all users): 6.0784
Avg (commenters): 7.6000
Avg (participants): 5.8774
Avg (non-participants): 6.5319
Views since voting: 1068
Views during voting: 275
Votes: 153
Comments: 13
Favorites: 1 (view)

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AuthorThread
Nikon D800
Nikon AF DC Nikkor 135mm f/2.0D
 03/09/2009 06:08:21 PM
Thanks for your explanation detailing how you got the image to this place. Lots of good stuff in there.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Nikon D700
Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G ED
 03/08/2009 01:17:18 AM
Terrific image, Tez. My initial reaction is to give a low score to the "over-processed" shots, but I just kept bumping this one up.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 Comments Made During the Challenge
Sony Alpha a7R III
Sony FE 24-105mm f/4 G OSS
 03/07/2009 08:21:54 PM
Very cool..... I love this. RAW..HDR??????? 9
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Canon EOS-40D
Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II
 03/07/2009 08:13:45 PM
This is just so insane, it must have ribbon.

Here's one I made:
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Kodak EasyShare C653
 03/06/2009 12:01:08 PM
the crazy waves, wow i hope this isn"t real. but great shot of the colorful waves crasghing.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
 03/06/2009 04:37:50 AM
You know what, I actively dislike (perhaps not strong enough a word) the processing here. The more so, I think, because its actually quite a strong image, with a great sense of composition and timing, and confidence in breaking the 'rules'. The ruin of a fine photo.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Canon EOS-60D
Canon EF 28-105mm f/3.5-4.5 USM
03/05/2009 07:47:58 PM
HDR all I can say about this is wow. I want to add this to my favorites.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Nikon D70
Nikon AF-S DX Zoom Nikkor 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6G IF-ED
 03/04/2009 11:08:55 AM
great shot, love the HDR
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Canon EOS-5D Mark II
Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8 L USM
 03/02/2009 03:29:10 PM
cool shot.. its a little hard to define the diver because the sky is also orange. cool though.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2
Panasonic Lumix 20mm f1.7 ASPH
 03/02/2009 03:28:37 PM
I like the boldness of this photo...the colors just pop...it looks surreal
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Nikon D800
Nikon AF-S Zoom-Nikkor 28-70mm f/2.8D IF-ED
 03/01/2009 06:55:26 PM
I find it tough to rate shots like this. I like the composition, and the texture in the photo, but find that when I look at the shot, it looks like it has been over processed, and therefore loses its photographic quality, and begins to look like digital art instead. 6 from me.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Canon EOS-350D Rebel XT
Canon EF 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM
 03/01/2009 06:14:57 PM
Reminds me of a picture in a book describing summer's long past. Beautiful colors and lighting.
  Photographer found comment helpful.
Olympus SP-570 UZ
 03/01/2009 09:46:50 AM
I love the idea of the picture...but, its too much "Editing" for me...but, nice shot
  Photographer found comment helpful.
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