Rusted valves

[DanK]

This is in in an old boiler house. The factory buildings date to the 19th century, but I don't know how old the equipment is. This is a first edit, so C&C very welcome.

[pnodrog]

At first I thought it was an electron microscopy photograph of one of my neurons.

A B&W version (maybe sepia) might be worth playing with.

[DanK]

I did try a very quick B&W version, pasted below. I changed the luminosity by color to try to make the pipes stand out more from the wall, but even so, I think they stand out less, and the image is less interesting to me. On the other hand, the B&W does seem to focus the eye more on the shape of the neuron.

What do you think? I may tweak both to see later.

[Round Tuit]

If you have the patience, you could increase the texture/clarity/local contrast of the pipes and valves while slightly blurring the wall behind.Then adjust the overall contrast to taste! The saturation of the plumbing looks good to me.

[stuck]

A drastic / love it or hate it approach might be to give it an engraved effect:

[escape]

A drastic / love it or hate it approach might be to give it an engraved effect:

It does lend itself to the love-it-or-hate-it approach. I took it to Photoshop and got some interesting results as well.

[DanK]

This thread really highlights how tastes and goals can differ: one suggestion to remove all texture, and another to add texture! In a local club I belong to, we have started experimenting with a discussion where a few people offer raw files and 3 or 4 other edit them however they would like. The first attempt was very interesting.

Here's the original for reference:



I added texture to this image in several ways, as I often do with this sort of material. For my taste, texture is a large part of what makes images of this sort, or images with a lot of weathered wood, interesting. I applied a large value using the texture slider in LR. The LR texture adjustment has a very subtle effect, and large values work well. I applied a very small amount of clarity because it mixes in midtone contrast, which has a lot of impact I would rather handle separately. I used local contrast via USM in Photoshop. I usually with a luminosity blend to avoid boosting saturation, but I sometimes use a normal blend or mix the two. Finally, I sharpened, in this case with smart sharpen. The contrast with the original should be clear.

As for taste: I like the colored background. It's a subtle mix of colors, and the color contrast with the valve is for the most part fairly gentle, which you can see by reading the R G and B values in different areas. It's very slightly less sharp than the valve; perhaps f/6.7 wasn't quite enough to keep it in sharp focus. I may try blurring it, but I think I will end up not using that.

I want to play more with additional dodging and burning and variations in saturation. In addition, in the bottom left, which was very bright in the original, the amount of burning I did started adding a gray cast. So in that area, I want to try using the multiply blend mode technique that I posted a while back.

Thanks for the comments.

[stuck]

No one has said they hated the engraved look so how about a colour version:

[Manfred M]

Dan - as someone who likes Industrial Photography, the one thing I find is that you are trying to do too much in this image. I suggest getting in close and concentrating on a smaller area where there is a clear subject / centre of interest.

The quote from Robert Capa; "If your image isn't good enough, you're not close enough" comes to mind.

[DanK]

Dan - as someone who likes Industrial Photography, the one thing I find is that you are trying to do too much in this image. I suggest getting in close and concentrating on a smaller area where there is a clear subject / centre of interest.

The quote from Robert Capa; "If your image isn't good enough, you're not close enough" comes to mind.

In this case, I have to disagree with you (although again, it's taste). I have done what you suggest in some circumstances. E.g., I have a print hanging that is nothing more than a hand-wrought 18th-century door latch on it's original weathered door. In this case, however, I did take a lot of photos of individual valves and the like on the same day, but they are mostly simply boring. I like this one because the various components create interesting shapes.

[Manfred M]

In this case, I have to disagree with you (although again, it's taste). I have done what you suggest in some circumstances. E.g., I have a print hanging that is nothing more than a hand-wrought 18th-century door latch on it's original weathered door. In this case, however, I did take a lot of photos of individual valves and the like on the same day, but they are mostly simply boring. I like this one because the various components create interesting shapes.

I was thinking more along these lines.

[DanK]

Ah, this is interesting. Thanks. I mistakenly thought you meant a much more severe crop. This is interesting for another reason: the additional asymmetry is interesting. I'll play with this idea.

That aside, how did you edit it? One change is clear: a lot more burning and perhaps global darkening. It also looks to me like either a hefty dose of clarity or substantial additional USM, this time with a normal blend mode.

[Manfred M]

Ah, this is interesting. Thanks. I mistakenly thought you meant a much more severe crop. This is interesting for another reason: the additional asymmetry is interesting. I'll play with this idea.

That aside, how did you edit it? One change is clear: a lot more burning and perhaps global darkening. It also looks to me like either a hefty dose of clarity or substantial additional USM, this time with a normal blend mode.

Other than the crop, I toned down the highlights (globally) and opened up the shadows (again globally). Added a bit of contrast, tweaked the brightness and added a slight vignette in the corners. The only local adjustment was to clone / heal out the small pipe on the bottom left.

No dodging or burning. I did not touch either clarity or sharpening.

All of your ideas are worth considering; I just didn't bother spending a lot of time on it.

[DanK]

Thanks. This is helpful.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[DanK]

This was interesting--everyone went in different directions. I did another edit. I ended up using a crop on the left similar to Manfred's but compensated by opening it up a little on the right. I did a bunch of things with tonality and changed the local contrast and sharpening, all to add a little pop.

Thanks for the input.