Forest Creatures

[Artshot]

I believe this image should capture some interest, but what would it take to turn it into a good photo?
My hope was to get even less airplane as it was climbing into clouds. I waited till it was in the trees to add even more obscurity, but they kind of look like an out of focus mess.
Any suggestions?

[xpatUSA]

I believe this image should capture some interest, but what would it take to turn it into a good photo?
My hope was to get even less airplane as it was climbing into clouds. I waited till it was in the trees to add even more obscurity, but they kind of look like an out of focus mess.
Any suggestions?

Intriguing concept!

I offer three suggestions:

1) use of levels or a curve to up the shadow contrast and reduce the highlight contrast. Global adjustment, without masking or layering - IOW, quick and dirty.

2) noting that the airplane by and large has much larger 'detail sizes' than the forest details, so use wavelet processing to reduce the contrast and acutance of the airplane versus the branches.

3) the plane has sharp edges, so some Gaussian smoothing to recede it a bit.

Good luck,

[Artshot]

Thanks for the suggestions. After reading a few paragraphs in RAW Wikipedia, suggestion #1 is looking very good.

[xpatUSA]

Thanks for the suggestions. After reading a few paragraphs in RAW Wikipedia, suggestion #1 is looking very good.

Yep, it's quite complicated. I did try some wavelets on your image but not a huge improvement. Might try again later . .

[selig1656]

I am not sure what it is exactly you wished to capture or convey in this piece. I feel kind of lost . The main subject and the sky seem to over blend , difficult to separate them , thus hard on my eyes .

[xpatUSA]

Thanks for the suggestions. After reading a few paragraphs in RAW Wikipedia, suggestion #1 is looking very good.

I have another suggestion, means going back to the scene though.

I imagine the desired impression, right or wrong, as one of looking up from an ancient forest and seeing a ghost from the future.

On that basis, the exposure is back-asswards; the trees should be in focus and plane should not be. So the tree-tops should be within a DOF and should be in focus whereas the plane should be outside the said DOF.

With no EXIF in the posted image, I'll use for example a 50mm lens, 1.5 crop camera, and the plane at a height of say 150m.

Set f/5.6 and focus at 10m. Set 400 ISO or more to freeze the plane.

Your far focus field will be about 18m and the DOF about 11m, thereby satisfying the conditions set forth above.

Numbers are from my own calculator which is set up for my vision (poor) and my monitor (24" diagonal). I used 0.02mm CoC. On-line calculators will give different numbers but the above example serves well enough to illustrate the idea.

[Artshot]

The intent was to create a moment of surprise, to first recognize the forest and then see something unexpected.
I believe this works, but it's not pretty. I kind of like the haunted forest feel it creates.
Your idea of changing the focus is a good idea and I will experiment some more.
Thanks for the input.

[Geoff F]

Crop a little from the left side would help. Remove that heavy vertical branch, possibly as close as the lower wing tip. You could also take a fraction from the right side or bottom if you want to end up with a standard image size ratio.

But, although the idea had potential, there are so many out of focus foreground branches that I don't think anything is going to work well. Might have been better if those branches were in focus and the plane was out of focus.

A difficult scene whatever you tried.

[Artshot]

Thanks to everyone who tried to keep this image airborne, but I think it's time to call 911.
Next time the opportunity arrises I'll try again.

[skitterbug]

Thanks to everyone who tried to keep this image airborne, but I think it's time to call 911.
Next time the opportunity arrises I'll try again.

Hi Art - Hope you don't mind one more comment about your photo. When I first saw it, I wasn't sure what I was seeing. Finally I picked out the airplane above the trees and chuckled because it reminded me of "hidden pictures" that are often published in children's magazines. I still enjoy doing those even though I'm "ancient" according to the grandkids!
I just wanted to say that I am drawn to this picture and I like it.

[Artshot]

Thanks Sandy.

[Wavelength]

This is a nice concept; the image is a bit heavy on the left

[KindachiShota]

Interesting concept....