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Archive 2016 · Fearless Fiona

  
 
lighthound
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Fearless Fiona


I'm not a B&W kinda guy (oddly enough) but I thought this one almost required it. I'm guessing you mono guys might enjoy it, I hope.

Needless to say, I don't have a lot of experience with conversions and kinda winged this one as best I could. I spent way too much time on this (off and on) over a period of several days. I'm not sure if it was worth it or not because now I'm bias towards it due to the time investment.
And I kept hearing Jim whisper in my ear... "if you have to spend more than 5 minutes on an image you should have not taken it in the first place".

Let me know what you think with all aspects of this image and after I get some feedback from you folks I'll share the un-edited sooc jpeg file that shows where this image started.
I'd share it now but I'd like some feedback first to see how I did.

Edit: And yes, as you can tell from this image, I like to make life difficult for myself.


Dave




The mutt




Apr 15, 2016 at 05:42 PM
beavens
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Fearless Fiona


Hey buddy - Fiona is looking great!

Color issues tend to go away when dealing with mono, eh?

Looking a bit flat and lacking depth at the moment. Unfortunately the subject is white on white, with the most pop coming at the point of max contrast. I feel your midtones need a boost here.

Did you get aggressive with the sharpening around her head/muzzle? Things are looking a little blocky/artifacted in that area.

I'd also consider tightening the crop up some.

Did you happen to convert this with SEP2? Don't be afraid to get heavy with Amplify Black!

Cheers,

Jeff



Apr 15, 2016 at 06:27 PM
eeneryma
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Fearless Fiona


beavens wrote:
Hey buddy - Fiona is looking great!

Color issues tend to go away when dealing with mono, eh?

Looking a bit flat and lacking depth at the moment. Unfortunately the subject is white on white, with the most pop coming at the point of max contrast. I feel your midtones need a boost here.

Did you get aggressive with the sharpening around her head/muzzle? Things are looking a little blocky/artifacted in that area.

I'd also consider tightening the crop up some.

Did you happen to convert this with SEP2? Don't be afraid to get heavy with Amplify Black!

Cheers,

Jeff


Jeff's helpful comments and suggestions aside, I love this!! It's as if Fiona has survived the turbulent, bubbling rapids, soggy and dripping, but standing tall and assertively, almost statuesque. Definitely worth continuing to work on in pp.

Steve



Apr 15, 2016 at 10:40 PM
beavens
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Fearless Fiona


eeneryma wrote:
Jeff's helpful comments and suggestions aside, I love this!! It's as if Fiona has survived the turbulent, bubbling rapids, soggy and dripping, but standing tall and assertively, almost statuesque. Definitely worth continuing to work on in pp.

Steve


100%! Stoic is the word that comes to my mind.

She is posing like whoa.



Apr 16, 2016 at 06:40 AM
lighthound
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Fearless Fiona


beavens wrote:
Hey buddy - Fiona is looking great!

Color issues tend to go away when dealing with mono, eh?

Looking a bit flat and lacking depth at the moment. Unfortunately the subject is white on white, with the most pop coming at the point of max contrast. I feel your midtones need a boost here.

Did you get aggressive with the sharpening around her head/muzzle? Things are looking a little blocky/artifacted in that area.

I'd also consider tightening the crop up some.

Did you happen to convert this with SEP2? Don't be afraid to get heavy with Amplify Black!

Cheers,

Jeff



Thanks Jeff! It's nice not having to worry about color issues but for some reason I loose depth perception when viewing B&W so I usually don't go there. It doesn't make sense and you would think B&W would be more appealing to me.

I just finished an edit with your suggestions in mind. Well except the crop. I have already cropped in a good bit and I don't want to loose the feel of the entire scene. The boulders she was on was actually and island (if you will) and if I trim off the top and left side I'll loose the dynamics of the waterfall and it would just be a bunch of BG clutter without presence.

I started completely over from scratch and skipped a few other NIK modules this time. And yep, I used SEP2 for the conversion. I saw the blockiness that you picked up on but couldn't figure out how to make it go away. I think I have it taken care of now. This was an absolute bitch to work on as it was harsh midday sun with an overwhelming amount of white.

It took me a while to find this "Amplify Black" in which you speak of. With the OP image I din't use any control points so I never saw that adjustment. I used the hell out of those control points this time.

Dave
---------------------------------------------

eeneryma wrote:
Jeff's helpful comments and suggestions aside, I love this!! It's as if Fiona has survived the turbulent, bubbling rapids, soggy and dripping, but standing tall and assertively, almost statuesque. Definitely worth continuing to work on in pp.

Steve


Thank you Steve! You gave me the encouragement I needed to start over from scratch to see if I could put Jeff's suggestion to work.

And yes, she is quite the character. I always thought Westies were kind of a girly, prissy, delicate kind of dogs but she has proven to be just the opposite. Her nick name is "Tank" because she's so rugged and nothing stops her when she puts her mind to it. Hence the harness you see on her. I think I'm going to rig up a vest/saddle for her so she can carry all my photo gear. I'll just have to make sure it's water proof.

Dave

---------------------------------------------

beavens wrote:
100%! Stoic is the word that comes to my mind.

She is posing like whoa.


Exactly!


Dave





The mutt edit




Apr 16, 2016 at 10:22 AM
beavens
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Fearless Fiona


lighthound wrote:
I just finished an edit with your suggestions in mind. Well except the crop. I have already cropped in a good bit and I don't want to loose the feel of the entire scene. The boulders she was on was actually and island (if you will) and if I trim off the top and left side I'll loose the dynamics of the waterfall and it would just be a bunch of BG clutter without presence.

it took me a while to find this "Amplify Black" in which you speak of. With the OP image I din't use any control points
...Show more

Oh the cropping would not be much - just feel like the right edge isn't offering you much.

Amplify Black is on the Control Points but also normally under Contrast!

Jeff



Apr 16, 2016 at 12:47 PM
lighthound
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Fearless Fiona


Here's the unedited sooc jpeg file that shows where I started from and how bad I screwed up on this shot.
My biggest mistake was that I forgot to take it out of "spot" metering from a previous scene I had just taken. After I locked focus (BBF) I recomposed and it metered on the waterfalls.

I normally don't bother with images this bad but I wanted to try and salvage this one.

Dave





sooc jpeg




Apr 16, 2016 at 01:33 PM
beavens
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Fearless Fiona


Ever consider pushing it more dramatic?

Almost like a gritty noire superherorine dog.

And your rework is looking better! A big time salvage job for sure in post - you ain't making it easy on yourself!

Jeff







Apr 16, 2016 at 04:45 PM





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