Berkshires in the fall: editing suggestions

[DanK]

A landscape photographer I am not. However, it was hard not to take photos while walking through the Berkshires this weekend during the peak foliage season.

The image below is a very quick edit. I intend to return to it later this week. However, being a lousy landscape photographer, I thought I would post this rough draft to see if anyone has suggestions.

Thanks for any ideas

[Shadowman]

Nice shot.

[pschlute]

Beautiful colours

[Manfred M]

Here's my quick edit. I started with a Nik Color Efex to bring out the leaves a bit more and the rest is all dodging and burning. I found the birch bark a bit too "hot" and distracting, so I calmed those areas down and brought up some of the other tree bark.

[DanK]

Manfred,

thanks. The burning on the left was on my list. I hadn't thought of burning the birches.

I have to think more about the impact of Color Efex. I have used it only a few times and don't yet understand it, but it seems to be doing two things: increasing saturation and changing hue selectively. For example, it turned some of the yellow leaves somewhat orange. In contrast, the reds and greens look at tad more saturated, but the hue seems unaltered. Is it actually changing hues, or is it it simply that the increase in saturation is more evidence in the reds than in the yellows, so that the slight orange tint is exaggerated?

Dan

[Manfred M]

Dan - I used three different effects in Color Efex Pro:

1. ND gradient - that's where a lot of the increased saturation comes from;
2. Pro Contrast - Correct contrast and Dynamic contrast were both set to 22%
3. Detail extractor - set to 3%

This is what the output of Color Efex is, isolated from all the other edits:

[DanK]

Manfred,

Thanks. I’ll have to go back and read about what those do

Dan


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