This photograph is of some of the boats that fish out of Pittenweem, a few miles further east of me, along the Fife coast.
What would you do to improve it?
[attachment=6309]
Nikon D80, Auto mode, 1/160 sec, f6.3, ISO 100, 78mm lens equivalent. Processed with Photoshop CS2.
Ask yourself, "What's most important for the final image?".
That is already a pleasant shot, John, and good to see the human activity there. Any adjustments would probably be just a matter of personal taste - for me it is just a tad too light. This one has been only slightly modified - a reduction of brightness of the mid-tones, an increase in contrast of the three central boats, and a very gentle vignette:
(May 22, 2016, 02:00)Eddy Canon Wrote: Hi John that image looks like an ideal candidate for HDR
John's image has a good balance of tones in its histogram and there appears to be no other evidence for the application of HDR techniques to this scene. As it stands, it is a good photograph, which successfully conveys the feeling of a small busy harbour. In my view, it just needs a bit of enhancement by a few subtle conventional tweaks. HDR techniques are simply unnecessary, unless the aim is to create a different effect - a more impressionistic tone-mapped digital image. This would be equally valid, within the range of what is currently acceptable in photographic art, but would it be John's intention?
I am not a lover of HDR for the sake of HDR. I will use HDR to bring out a range of tones that a single exposure cannot capture. On the day this image was captured it was overcast and the dynamic range was pretty limited, so I feel there is nothing more to be brought out. I do not have a raw version of this image (taken prior to my epiphany) or I would give it a try. I will have a look at the original JPEG and see what I can do though.
Ask yourself, "What's most important for the final image?".
Hi John this is my HDR style tone mapped from your first picture (jpeg), HDR / tone mapping does not always have to be so radical, it can be quite subtle but have the ability to lift an image, not everyone's cup of tea but should we always dismiss it, I do not have the benefit, that John had when he took this shot so I have to ask is a good snap shot of a memory, or indeed a good image? but as they say this is only my opinion and it's not intended to offend.
So lets embrace HDR/tone mapping etc and get out there
Interesting, I did this HDR this morning after John's post, I say I did, in reality, I uaed a prog I bought from Ashampo, £14, instead of £50, got my money back, no inst/help, which I did eventually find, but the prog was never blocked, so all I did was press bittons and choose, no input from me really. Not my work.
I am sinplistic! If any pic, cannot be seen as edited in any way, by anyone, at some time, then it is a Digital Image, not a pic.
So here is a pic/digital image. Pre posting it appears close to Eddies. Not really sure what tone mapping is. Ed.
Post edit, they do appear similar, mine is sharper.
To each his own!
(This post was last modified: May 22, 2016, 12:37 by EdMak.)
Eddy. Nothing wrong with your HDR image. I just don't see what it offers over my original, or indeed, Philip's edit. It may be an improvement at your end, but once uploaded here, I can see no discernible differences. How did you achieve it?
Ask yourself, "What's most important for the final image?".
I agree, John. There is nothing at all wrong with creating pseudo HDR images, but none of these results improves your original for me - Posts #9 and #12 are too far from reality, and Post #11 looks lighter than perhaps it should for an overcast day.
