Shopping Day, N. Michigan Ave., the Magnificent Mile of Chicago.
Tech: Duplicated photograph, desaturated duplicate layer then used eraser tool to uncover the any red color in the background. Gaussian blur duplicate layer. Unsharp mask background layer.
Statistics
Place: 34 out of 227 Avg (all users): 5.8756 Avg (commenters): 6.7333 Avg (participants): 5.7344 Avg (non-participants): 6.0988 Views since voting: 1208 Votes: 209 Comments: 20 Favorites: 0
Before digging in to this image, I went to review your portfolio - I'm very impressed with your skills; you do a great job on the "Chicago" theme. I especially liked "The Race" - it's perfect. And I predicted "Bowls" would ribbon - glad it did because it's a superb image.
The Dream is a real departure from your usual style - but is very effective. It obviously took a lot of post procesing - which for the most part was well done. There are still remnants of color in the sky area, a building and cars - as some have already mentioned. You may want to search the forums as there are a couple good threads on different methods of desat. For example - you could select the channels other than red - and convert to grayscale - leaving just the red.
The soft focus along with the hectic traffic make the picture appear dreamy or surreal. And, your title is simple, effective and drives home the point.
The lady in red is a perfect anchor point and adds loads of interest. You wonder, "Will she make it?" or "What if the lights turn green?" She may be better if her suit were a bit brighter.
Finally, I'm impressed with the traffic light system. It really is a dream that all the lights were red at the same time. Perhaps they have a way of doing that for emergency vehicles, or you just have perfect timing! Red from here to infinity.
I note that the image size is under half of that allowed. I don't see any obvious compressin problems though - so I assume it didn't need much space with mostly greyscale pixels.
Thanks. This is really helpful. I need to come back to this picture and try the desat technique that you suggested and also will try to increase the brightness of her suit. I will post the results in DPCPrints. Thanks again.
I take this route everyday; the synchronized lights amaze me all the time and I always wanted to take a photo of it, but I am always in a car or bus. I thought this was perfect for the challenge especially that this is how I dream if I remember my dream - desat with only one color, usually red, hence the title - so I took two afternoons early to specifically take pictures. There is especially a point on the avenue where there is a rise so you can see all the lights. I stood on one of the median planters and waited for opportunities. I probably looked like a fool standing there. I had another one with another lady in red but she was just standing on the curb and another one with a wedding party on the next planter (!). But this was the most appropriate.
Before digging in to this image, I went to review your portfolio - I'm very impressed with your skills; you do a great job on the "Chicago" theme. I especially liked "The Race" - it's perfect. And I predicted "Bowls" would ribbon - glad it did because it's a superb image.
The Dream is a real departure from your usual style - but is very effective. It obviously took a lot of post procesing - which for the most part was well done. There are still remnants of color in the sky area, a building and cars - as some have already mentioned. You may want to search the forums as there are a couple good threads on different methods of desat. For example - you could select the channels other than red - and convert to grayscale - leaving just the red.
The soft focus along with the hectic traffic make the picture appear dreamy or surreal. And, your title is simple, effective and drives home the point.
The lady in red is a perfect anchor point and adds loads of interest. You wonder, "Will she make it?" or "What if the lights turn green?" She may be better if her suit were a bit brighter.
Finally, I'm impressed with the traffic light system. It really is a dream that all the lights were red at the same time. Perhaps they have a way of doing that for emergency vehicles, or you just have perfect timing! Red from here to infinity.
I note that the image size is under half of that allowed. I don't see any obvious compressin problems though - so I assume it didn't need much space with mostly greyscale pixels.
That sign on the right looks strangely more in focus than the rest of the picture. But I love how all the red pops out and that you included the detail of the blonde hair. Nice touch.
HA! Very unique and a great image. The soft focus even works for this shot -- I wonder what others say about the focus... I guess I'll check later. This would be better if you'd dropped all the green and desaturated all colors but the red. The lady in red (lower right) raises the rating by at least 2 points. One of my favorites in this challenge.
The dream, or, the nightmare? Great work - this is one of the few pictures that meet the challenge and do what was intended. I would have given you a 10 except the woman's hair doesn't fit with the other untouched items in your photo. Rated 9.
Oh wow! Possible improvement: selecting and desaturating the spurious spots and banners in the background where some red is left, and selecting the woman to increase saturation on her clothes. As it is now it took me a while to notice her. I very much like the surreal effect of this!
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