Cleaning Up the Desk

[gcowan]

I have been cleaning up my desk and trying to make some order. I found disks of scans which came back with my prints from a trip in 2006. They are fairly course, so I decided to see what I could make of them. The camera was an Olympus OM1 with 50mm f1.8 Zuiko lens, the film was Fuji Press 400 Negative film. I probably tried to use f8 or f11 ISO 400 but it was dark and hand held so maybe not.

Grand Canyon Sunset B&W



Yosemite National Park B&W Nod to AA



Over sharpened? The scans were small JPEG files so probably had some capture sharpening added. I was pretty aggressive with my sharpening.


Graham

[PhotoRob]

The waterfall is Ansel-like, no doubt - I like it...

[Mike Buckley]

The sharpening seems just right to me. I really like the photo of Yosemite Falls. The low-lying clouds really make that photo.

Very nice conversions on both of them. You might want to lift some of the detail in the darkest areas of the Yosemite photo. Depending on what you had in mind, you might want to use more contrast in the middle section of the Grand Canyon photo.

[gcowan]

Thanks Mike & Robert,

I had never been to either place before, so I was looking with rather dazzled tourist's eyes. I really want to go back to Yosemite some time and spend some time there.

I rather like the dark on the Yosemite shot. It speaks to me of how I saw it, those pines are almost black to my eyes even when I see them in colour. I darkened it down a lot to get the emphasis on the rock face and the waterfall.

I don't think I can get any more useful contrast out of the Grand Canyon Photo. The scan is fairly low res and I pushed the red and orange as hard as I could to get the contrast up before I converted it in Silver Effects. I will dig out the negative and scan it myself at a higher resolution and see if I can get some more out of it.

Graham

[Mike Buckley]

I had never been to either place before, so I was looking with rather dazzled tourist's eyes.

I rarely visit places more than once though I have visited both of them repeatedly. Give up on the idea of not being dazzled.

I rather like the dark on the Yosemite shot. It speaks to me of how I saw it, those pines are almost black to my eyes even when I see them in colour. I darkened it down a lot to get the emphasis on the rock face and the waterfall.

You did a great job of post-processing your photo as you envisioned it. Despite the suggestion that I made, the overall mood definitely works for me.

I don't think I can get any more useful contrast out of the Grand Canyon Photo.

The concept I was thinking of involves only selecting the middle area of the converted image and applying a very slight S-curve.

[gcowan]

The concept I was thinking of involves only selecting the middle area of the converted image and applying a very slight S-curve.

Hi Mike,
I really increased the contrast in the centre with a curves layer and painted in the mask where I wanted the effect. I then made a 50% grey fill layer and painted some highlight areas in black to tone them down a bit and white to restore some detail to the deep shadows. I then made a smart layer and did a smart sharpen to enhance local contrast then a final output sharpen.
Thanks I think it has enhanced the image though it has lost some of the haze that I remember from the day.

Grand Canyon B&W.




I noticed that it must have been early afternoon when I took the shot not sunset as I think I called the original image.

I thought it might be interesting to post the colour scan after lots of enhancement and before B&W conversion

Grand Canyon Colour


I think it is interesting how the pinks and yellows change the contrast requirement.

Graham

[Mike Buckley]

Your revised black-and-white has so much more interest and drama. More importantly, the viewer is now pulled into the image. Now that you have improved it so much, consider toning down the bright cloud in the top left corner, as it's distracting from the rest of your very nice photo.

[Aforns]

Sure prefer the B&W versions, sweet find !!