Sweet blossoms and even sweeter light! Unfortunately the path kind of draws me off into the corner, which isn't as exciting as the blossoms - a slight crop off the left edge just past that leftmost path light seems to help for me, just a thought.
Very sweet lighting in this. I really like how that was handled. I agree with Floris about a very slight crop on the left side. But still a very nice shot!
Is this an example of HDR? I ask because it seems that the colors and contrasts are very intense and dramatic, and I'm not sure how one would capture than in-camera.
If it's not, please enlighten this beginning student!
BTW - I also agree about the crop, and also that the picture is just fabulous. So jealous!
Believe it or not, this is an HDR. This is the type of lighting conditions where I am finding HDR is a useful tool. I will post after work a before HDR and a after HDR. The change is quite dramatic and I liked it, so I used it
I know, a shock to hear such words but I'm keeping an open mind on new techiques where they might actually work.
realkuhl wrote:
Believe it or not, this is an HDR. This is the type of lighting conditions where I am finding HDR is a useful tool. I will post after work a before HDR and a after HDR. The change is quite dramatic and I liked it, so I used it
I know, a shock to hear such words but I'm keeping an open mind on new techiques where they might actually work.
hmm.. it sure looks good for an HDR, I would've expected it to be blending as Phil did.. If you could share some more workflow details when you post the before and after that'd be great too!
You're doing a great job of capturing these Cherry blossoms between the snow/hail/rain/snail/snain/whatever as of late. You're also making me feel guilty for not getting my fotos out as well ;-)
Great capture and I like the color contrast and the star halos around the lights --what were you at? f/11?
Strength 64
Color Saturation 59
Light Smoothing +1 (4th button from left)
Luminosity -8
Micro-contrast (5th button from left (Max))
Micro-smoothing 14
White Clipping 0.65%
Black Clipping 0.28%
Gamma = 1.00
NOTE: Just because this worked pretty well doesn't mean I love HDR. In most cases I think it's used improperly because it is being asked to blend images where the various exposures are too far away (-1.-, 0, +1 etc) instead of smaller steps. This was done with a single image with fairly moderate settings so it's not all that extreme. In cases like this, I think it can become a very useful tool to enhance areas in an image (with a layer mask).
Perhaps its the image size, but do tell me if your picture is suffering from diffraction when viewed at a normal print size or did you stitch in the light flares as well?
Yes, I guess tone mapped isn't technically HDR, but in a way I think it is.....
Daniel, I'm using the 17-40 and it's pretty sweet but yes, anything about f/11 introduces image quality breakdown, but given the conditions, it seems that it would print pretty nice up to 14 x 21 which is about the largest I print any of my images.
BTW, there may be some degradation of image due to diffraction at smaller f-stops, but I don't really find it much of an issue...To me, it's one of those over-analyzed variables of the digital age
This scene does seem like an excellent candidate for HDR, done with restraint, as you show, to enhance the atmosphere of the picture as a whole without destroying the tonal integration. Beautifully framed, too.
Mar 29, 2008 at 06:06 AM
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