Craig Gillette wrote:
Nice light, etc., but the color looks off. The trees don't look right.
I agree with Craig. Both versions of the image look too cranked up, as though you over-did HDR processing, contrast and saturation, or PhotoShop's clarity slider. Some people like this effect, as evidenced by what oohs and aahs in the galleries. However, for me, the result is too harsh and too unreal. You might try minimally processing your RAW image--just enough to deal with balancing exposures of your shadows and highlights, retaining details in the clouds and steam, and making other slight adjustments to compensate for how the mind's eye sees the scene but the sensor doesn't adequately represent. There's a lot of good material here to work with, but I think the exaggerations degrade, rather than enhance, the image.
Thanks for the feedback JDC. I agree with your assessment. There was no HDR, just processing through bad eyes. Now after a week with one fixed eye and the other coming in a few days, I'll rework this from the start. I know how it should look. I simply need to do it in a way that others see it properly.
Very nice Jeffrey. I've been going to Hot Creek since the mid 1980's when I took a geology class there and it's one of my favorite places to soak, until the government closed it off . But this photo has really nice color and I like the movement (long exposure).
I wonder how it would have looked if you used an intensifier filter ("didymium")?
jdc562 wrote:
I agree with Craig. Both versions of the image look too cranked up, as though you over-did HDR processing, contrast and saturation, or PhotoShop's clarity slider. Some people like this effect, as evidenced by what oohs and aahs in the galleries. However, for me, the result is too harsh and too unreal. You might try minimally processing your RAW image--just enough to deal with balancing exposures of your shadows and highlights, retaining details in the clouds and steam, and making other slight adjustments to compensate for how the mind's eye sees the scene but the sensor doesn't adequately represent. There's a lot of good material here to work with, but I think the exaggerations degrade, rather than enhance, the image.
. But this photo has really nice color and I like the movement (long exposure).