Thought this might go down better here as its all ALenses....
Went back to the beach where it all began last night to find that the place has completely changed. A foot and a half of sand has shifted its way up completely redirecting a stream to make a sharp right. All my favourite rocks are now totally buried in sand. It was a complete let down and then a raging success.
These images are taken in a 1DsIII, the first one with a Contax 35-70, the second with a Nikon 14-24, both adapted lenses and simply the best combination I have ever used at the coast. Both at f16. Both images are exposure blended, not only because I dont use grads, but because an image like this would be impossible to render using one.
Great images. I love the perspectival compositions that lead you into the distance from the foreground. I would prefer to see the sky less manipulated and more consistent with the overall lighting of the scene for a less 'cgi' look. I bet the detail is fantastic though.
It was simply bringing the blues downwards in the black and white conversion that darkened things up. It it seemed to balance things out well, then I rang Dreakworks. It was thick raincloud, so I have some license
Well you have to think about what sections of the image have to be blended. Firstly the sky, everything above the rock line is the first exposure, everything below is from the second exposure except the bright area on the sand at the far left which is also from the first exposure. Each exposure is around 3 stops apart, so its like controlling the light with a 3stop ND except where I want it, not where some stupid bit of plastic tells me it should be. You can see with geology like this a straight line grad is going to be very helpful I dont think...
Seemless blending of multiple exposures in this manner is a complicated topic, but I hope you can get the idea from that...