Experimentation with post-processing, requesting feedback

[CIC]

If you go to this part of his website: http://shaazjung.com/light-and-shadows/ and look at the third image, there is no question that this is a composite.

Thank you so much Manfred for your reply. These are pretty obvious examples and I suspected the same. Though I was more interested to find how he managed to get the moods in his photos displayed under "India", "Africa" etc.

I find that your elephants are very well done, but personally, I find that the areas of grass and ground are a bit too intense and in need of a bit of desaturation; on the grass both the yellow and green channels and on the ground the red and yellow channels.

I tried to open up the shadows a bit on the dark parts of the elephants, as a bit more texture there would help, but there isn't enough data in the posted file to work with.

Thank you again. I had applied a vignette to this photo to draw the viewers' attention to the heads of the elephant. I did try to reduce the saturation of the background, but I was unable to separate the subject from the background effectively. And I am mortally afraid of having halos around the edges. I also tried to reduce the brightness of the background to better separate it from the subject. I am not sure where I made a mistake that I was unable to effectively desaturate and darken the background.

[Manfred M]

Thank you so much Manfred for your reply. These are pretty obvious examples and I suspected the same. Though I was more interested to find how he managed to get the moods in his photos displayed under "India", "Africa" etc.



Thank you again. I had applied a vignette to this photo to draw the viewers' attention to the heads of the elephant. I did try to reduce the saturation of the background, but I was unable to separate the subject from the background effectively. And I am mortally afraid of having halos around the edges. I also tried to reduce the brightness of the background to better separate it from the subject. I am not sure where I made a mistake that I was unable to effectively desaturate and darken the background.

The mood in his shots comes largely from the light; he knows it well and uses it effectively. Much of his work appears to be done early in the morning or late in the day when the light is quite interesting.

He employs a lot of tools; dodging and burning, heavy vignettes, selective focus (that at times seems to be enhances through a Gaussian blur) and in many of his shots, he goes for very low contrast (a technique that I personally don't feel is pariticlarly effective and his shots would be stronger if he added contrast). He gently desaturates parts of his image to make them look like they are taken in a dry and dusty environment. He definitely does photocompositing in some of these pieces

This one is another obvious photocomposite:







In your shots, look at using some of the selection tools that are available in Photoshop; I use a lot of them in my work, but the Quick Selection tool is the one I use most often; halos are something I watch for too and generally I use minimal feathering of my sections if I notice halos. There are ways to remove the in places if you happen to do so by accident, but the process is time consuming (I clone out the halo with a very small brush that is somewhat soft).

[CIC]

The mood in his shots comes largely from the light; he knows it well and uses it effectively. Much of his work appears to be done early in the morning or late in the day when the light is quite interesting.

He employs a lot of tools; dodging and burning, heavy vignettes, selective focus (that at times seems to be enhances through a Gaussian blur) and in many of his shots, he goes for very low contrast (a technique that I personally don't feel is pariticlarly effective and his shots would be stronger if he added contrast). He gently desaturates parts of his image to make them look like they are taken in a dry and dusty environment. He definitely does photocompositing in some of these pieces

This one is another obvious photocomposite:







In your shots, look at using some of the selection tools that are available in Photoshop; I use a lot of them in my work, but the Quick Selection tool is the one I use most often; halos are something I watch for too and generally I use minimal feathering of my sections if I notice halos. There are ways to remove them in places if you happen to do so by accident, but the process is time-consuming (I clone out the halo with a very small brush that is somewhat soft).

Thank you so much, Manfred. Your comment is not only an eye-opener but also a guideline for me. I shall try to incorporate your teachings more and if you do not mind, seek your advice again and again.