Continuing the quest to improve

[Bloodnok]

Having got some useful feedback from my last posting (thanks, Kraellin), I'd like to subject another image to the process.

This is one that I'm quite pleased with, but I'd value other opinions, especially how to improve the composition of the image. As I said before, I'm trying to take things a step at a time, and getting the composition right is, I feel, the most important step: you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, as they say.

The attached image is quite small to get under the upload limit, so there's a bigger version here

The only processing I've done is to tweak it in RawShooter Premium and a slight crop to a different aspect ratio.

Go on, hit me - be brutal.

[Gary Richardson]

Hi Bloodnok,

Overall the image is a bit dark, (could be that was the effect you were looking for), and the cars drew the eye away from the objects of interest.

So I tweaked levels a bit to brighten it up a little, cropped a little closer (to focus more on building), and cloned out the cars.

[goose443]

Nice improvements Gary. I couldn't help but wonder what the image would look like with pumped up colors. A very different mood.

[mseydel]

I felt like the composition would work better as a square, or close to one. I also felt like it did need a bit more color, as well as some delineation of the trees...I added a layer of high pass at about 12 on hard light at 45%. The original is a bit dark, and in search of a focal point.

[blue dog]

Bloodnok,

I'm going to agree with Gary as far as he went. I love the way the house jumps off the page, but there is too much else going on. That is, I am not sure what its a picture of. To me that usually means I should start cropping until I find a finely focused picture in there. Gary did just enough by cloning out the cars to tell me that's the way to go. Simplification through cropping (and cloning).

[Gary Richardson]

Goose 443, like the increased reds in your rendition, they make the hillsides pop. Not too sure about the grass in front of the house (possibly a touch too green for my taste), but that could be taken care of easily by a masked hue/sat layer, or by careful use of sponge tool.

[Bloodnok]

Thanks, folks - that's a lot for me to think about. It's interesting how just some simple tweaks can completely alter the mood of a picture. The effect I was going for was somewhat dark and brooding (it is in Wales, after all). Whilst adjusting levels in RSP, I basically hit the combination I posted and was immediately struck by a sort of "old master" feel. Not suggesting that it's up to Constable standards, but there was something about the quality of the browns and greys that kind of reminded me of an old oil painting.

Gary: I like removing the cars and the tighter cropping. I'll have to wait till I get home to judge the effect of lightening it (my work computer's screen hasn't been properly calibrated).

goose443: that tweak completely changes the mood to something brighter and more springlike. I like it, although, as I say, I was going for the brooding, Welsh mountains look.

mseydel: Square works - I'll try a few different aspect ratios, but I like that.

Sharpening is something I hadn't got round to - I've only just been reading up on its importance and the various ways of doing it, so that's the next stage after I improve the composition.

Thanks for the advice, everyone. I'll do some more work on it when I get a bit of time and post the result here for further criticism.

[NancyJ]

I like it and I like the dark. I think you captured what you intended. If I were going to do anything to it - (first I'd make it bigger so we can see it properly ) I'd remove the tree branch/shoot from the foreground, its quite distracting.

[Bloodnok]

Originally Posted by NancyJ

I like it and I like the dark. I think you captured what you intended. If I were going to do anything to it - (first I'd make it bigger so we can see it properly ) I'd remove the tree branch/shoot from the foreground, its quite distracting.

Well, there's a limit on what I can upload to photobucket, but I'll see what I can do. As for removing the branch, I'd like to, but my cloning skills aren't up to it, yet, I fear.

[Ziaphra]

Upload to imageshack...I think youy files can be up to 1mb.

http://imageshack.us/

[NancyJ]

Originally Posted by Bloodnok

Well, there's a limit on what I can upload to photobucket, but I'll see what I can do. As for removing the branch, I'd like to, but my cloning skills aren't up to it, yet, I fear.

Sorry, Missed the link to the bigger version - looks great, very crisp and the colours are perfect.

[Bloodnok]

OK, what I've done is this:

I like Gary and goose's changes, but I wanted to keep the brooding look. I'll probably make another couple of versions incorporating the lightening and the pumped up colours at another point. For now, gloomy and oil-paint-esque it is. I did, however, add a curves layer with the sky masked out, and this has given the driveway area a bit more impact, I feel.

I cropped it to 10x8 aspect ratio approximately where Gary cropped it. I may set myself a calendar project later, for which a square crop would work well.

I've cloned out the cars. I think this is OK-ish, but I certainly need more practice. I didn't trust myself to clone out the foreground branch, so I darkened it slightly.

I haven't sharpened it (because I forgot), but I'll get round to that later.

Also, I think saving it as with no embedded profile, rather than embedding the AdobeRGB1998 profile (which I did before) has made the displayed colours look more like they do when I'm editing it. They're a bit deeper and richer.

Anyway, the original is here, and the new version (larger for Nancy's benefit) is here

Thanks to everyone who took the time to critique and, if I haven't followed all your advice, I still appreciate it and will try experimenting in those directions in future.

[Littlecoo]

Oooh! Love the brooding mood. I take it that the cottage and grounds are your focal point but I was attracted to that sky. The cottage seemed at odds with it. I tried to give the sky some more emphasis/drama without spoiling that delicious brooding quality of it. I masked all but the sky and after some fiddling, settled for a directional light effect to brighten some of the sky just a little. To me this seemed to add a sense of balance within the image without drastically changing anything.

[Bloodnok]

Littlecoo: that's nice, really dramatic. I had left the sky, since I wasn't sure what to do with it, but now you've given me the idea, I'll have another play with it.

[oltenius]

Beautiful landscape.

[Bloodnok]

OK, final version (for now) is here

I've tweaked the sky a bit and added a little sharpening. I also had to run a soften brush over the skyline to get rid of some excess contrast there.

Thanks for all the help - I've learned a lot from this session.

[manta1900]

That's a very nice photo. Was that the lighting? or there was more?

[rutherford]

Hi,

Nice picture! I like its mood and the composition. I think that now you could start experiencing with some sharpening, contrast and colour experiments.

I downloaded your file from the link and did the following:

duplicate the entire layer into a new layer. de-saturate it (command+shift+u) and apply a high pass filter of 2. after the high pass is applied, press command+L and a levels dialog box will appear. move the left slider (shadows) and the right slider (highlights) toards each other until both are where the information of the picture starts (base of the black graphic). after that, put this layer in overlay blending mode and try the amount of transparency until you find a sharpen level you like (mine worked well at 30%).

after that, get your eye dropper tool and sample a tone of green that you find nice. with that sampled, create a solid colour layer on top of your sharpening and place it in colour blending mode. Again try the oppacity lever and find a tone that you find matches your picture.

As for contrasting, you can try and make a merged copy of the image (command+option+shift+e), de-saturate it and place it in overlay mode, again finding an oppacity amount that pleases you. Just mind the high light and shadow points of your image so they don't get too white or too dark.

Again, these are just some suggestions. Feel free to experiment with them, as for instance, instead of sampling green on the picture, try sampling brownish tones and find out what happens.

Hope to have been of some help, and again, nice work!

Cheers!


George Rutherford
www.seagullsfly.com

ps: when I say command = ctrl and option = alt on pc

[Bloodnok]

manta1900: thanks for the compliment. As I remember, the light was a bit flat (overcast with occasional rain), but I think I caught that picture as the sun appeared through some thinner cloud, which is why the house is quite bright. Most of the adjustments were made using RawShooter Premium to enhance the colour and contrast. The sky I did in Paint Shop Pro.

rutherford: thanks for the hints. I've come across a masked sharpening method (still trying to get it right ) on Ron Bigelow's site, but it's not quite the same as you've described. I'll play with the colour and contrast tips at some point (once I've translated them into PSP equivalents) - at the moment, I'm going into brain melt with all the techniques that I'm finding out about...

[Duffy Pratt]

Nice shot.

With a curve, I set the white in the building to 244,244,244.

Then converted to LAB, did a curve on an adjustment layer, raising the mid highlights a hair on the L, and then applying steep slope straight lines on the A and B channels. This made the reds too severe, so I locked down the green side of the A curve, and reduced the slope on the red side to taste.

Applied USM to the L channel at 150, 1.1, 3 and converted back to sRGB.

Duffy