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Step Back In Time

W

Wade Skinner

Member
As some of you may recognize, this is a shot from one of the many temples in the city of Angkor, Cambodia.

I hoped to capture the ancientness of this place.

As I am a beginner, anything to help me improve would be well received.

2a6qsly.jpg
 
D

Duke Beattie

Member
The ruins look very interesting.. I like the composition. But what did you do in post?.. The whole thing looks almost solarized.. Was the sky added in after the fact? The transition from the buildings to the sky looks artificial. I think a more straight forward presentation would be better. Granted I could be wrong, but maybe more explanation about the process would help.
 
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Wade Skinner

Member
I see what you mean about the transition from the buidlings to the sky, but no, it's all original. I did some kind of "making the photo look older" thing in PE. A bit over the top eh? Maybe I'll tone it down a little.

Thank you for your comments.
 
W

Wade Skinner

Member
Once again, with a little less on the overkill.


2r2lthi.jpg


I'm not sure if it's a photo really worth fussing over......... but I thought there could be something there............... (I'm a fan of the saying, "when in doubt, throw it out"). We use it in the cooking world, but I think it translates well to photography! :)
 
D

Duke Beattie

Member
I like the overall photo.. Maybe somewhere between the two?
Maybe something like this?? I don't know, maybe, it needs to be more dark and brooding? There is a lot of detail the the dark bits..

118501293.jpg
 
Asher Kelman

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Wade,

I do like this scene and agree with Duke's comments and the direction of his edited version of your picture of the ruins. What is P.E.? In any case, what are you trying to show? I must admit to you first that too I use all sorts of filters for my art work, multiplying subtracting and taking the first derivative, all in pursuit of some artifact that I want to maximize.

However, here you already have a picture, the contents of which, in themselves, are compelling. Sure, it has been photographed many times, but no one ever arrived with your eyes. So what do we have here? Well we don't know since you appear to have thrown away a lot of the precious data that the camera collected. I say "appear" as we haven't seen your original, but likeely as not, each paving stone had patina and more form and detail. Where is all that history of 10,000 footsteps in each year, for centuries? Where has it all gone?

So, might you post the original, in color, then perhaps we can start again. You don't have to follow this path as I am only a voice for declaring options, not an instructor. In starting again, first what do you want to do with this picture? What's the best you'd like it to be? What might it mean to you. With these questions answered one can go at it with a fresh set of goals. OTOH, maybe this is the look you wanted all the time and if so, that's fine too. Then I'll look at it again.

Asher
 
K

Ken Tanaka

pro member
Concentrate on just getting the best pure image you can get. Pay attention to light, color and form. To heck with the computer gimmicks.
 
W

Wade Skinner

Member
Well Asher, with all that being said I guess I wanted to bring out how old this place is. There is an eeriness' about it at the same time (I found that was better portrayed in black and white).





****
b5k1oj.jpg










As I've stated in my other posts, I'm not very good with the post production editing so I'm not sure I have the ablility to make the way I would ultimately like. It's something I need to put some time to.
 
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W

Wade Skinner

Member
Reflections of the Past

Rather than start a new thread, I decided to add this photo in here as it is in keeping with the theme. Just your regular reflective landscape. But I like the architecture.





2cn79yx.jpg
[/IMG]
 
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Paul Abbott

New member
Wade, you have two very nice images, but with the first it needs some PP attention.
Here I have taken the liberty to do some quick PP'ing on your image.

I'm no expert at post-processing, but I only use Lightroom for a lot of my stuff. Here I increased the overall exposure of the image, and used the yellow and orange channels to give more contrast to the tones in the stonework. I then recovered the sky and used the blue channel slightly to get some darker tones in it. As I said, i'm no expert but this image is great and I like it, and it deserves some attention, better results can be gotten from the RAW image though.



angkor1of1borcon.jpg


Wade Skinner - Angkor, Cambodia​
 
Asher Kelman

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Paul,

An improvement, but which image did you start with, the B&W or the subsequent latest color one?

Asher
 
Nigel Allan

Nigel Allan

Member
Nice subject matter to work with. I think the advice given by Ken is spot on.

Go for the clean image with good exposure and composition and let your image make its own statement - leave the digital acrobatics to others who are really into that sort of thing. Certainly this is advice I am taking on board for myself.

A good shot, like a good idea (or a strong melody in music), will stand out almost irrespective of the post production treatment many times and in my humble opinion many people kill great photographs by over manipulation in PP. You see it in all the photography magazines where they feature shots with very heavy skies and different effects and I wonder sometimes that if I went to that location would it look anything like that. I think it is digital overkill.

It's a bit akin to modern hip hop music which is so overdubbed and over produced in the studio (digitally again!) that they often lose the 'clean' sound and truth of the melody and can't reproduce it in real life without a backing track.

This obsession with over production in music has also meant that they have lost the 'quiet bits' to in modern music and have to fill every space...I think this is what is happening in digital photography...sometimes silence or minimalism is golden

Frequently less is more and I think in this digital age it can be quite brave to be minimal in your pictures and get back to basics.

there I've got it off my chest, sorry for rambling and if it appeared like a rant, but it made me feel better :)

I actually liked the colour version and think that worked better than the over processed one. Although Paul did a great job on it giving it more contrast

Personally I prefer black and white photos with good contrast, strong blacks and bright whites, and the first one seemed a bit muddy...could I have done it any better? I doubt it
 
W

Wade Skinner

Member
Thanks Nigel,

To be honest, I wasn't really convinced from the get go that this was a photo worth worrying about. I thought that making it black and white would perhaps reveal more of the 'antiquity' of this place, and in turn, make it a more visually appealing image.

Thanks for the thoughts.

Kind Regards

Wade Skinner


Nigel Allan said:
Nice subject matter to work with. I think the advice given by Ken is spot on.

Go for the clean image with good exposure and composition and let your image make its own statement - leave the digital acrobatics to others who are really into that sort of thing. Certainly this is advice I am taking on board for myself.

A good shot, like a good idea (or a strong melody in music), will stand out almost irrespective of the post production treatment many times and in my humble opinion many people kill great photographs by over manipulation in PP. You see it in all the photography magazines where they feature shots with very heavy skies and different effects and I wonder sometimes that if I went to that location would it look anything like that. I think it is digital overkill.

It's a bit akin to modern hip hop music which is so overdubbed and over produced in the studio (digitally again!) that they often lose the 'clean' sound and truth of the melody and can't reproduce it in real life without a backing track.

This obsession with over production in music has also meant that they have lost the 'quiet bits' to in modern music and have to fill every space...I think this is what is happening in digital photography...sometimes silence or minimalism is golden

Frequently less is more and I think in this digital age it can be quite brave to be minimal in your pictures and get back to basics.

there I've got it off my chest, sorry for rambling and if it appeared like a rant, but it made me feel better :)

I actually liked the colour version and think that worked better than the over processed one. Although Paul did a great job on it giving it more contrast

Personally I prefer black and white photos with good contrast, strong blacks and bright whites, and the first one seemed a bit muddy...could I have done it any better? I doubt it
Click to expand...
 
Nigel Allan

Nigel Allan

Member
I hope you don't mind and I will remove it if you do, but I thought I would have a go with it. Now, I am certainly no expert in PP but I play around with settings in Lightroom until I get something I find pleasing. It was actually not so easy to work with since there are a lot of hard shadows and high contrast within the detail so it is easy for it to look a mess (not your fault, just the nature of the rock and only my opinion anyway. I am sure someone will tell me if I am wrong)

b5k1oj1.jpg
 
W

Wade Skinner

Member
Nigel Allan said:
I hope you don't mind and I will remove it if you do, but I thought I would have a go with it. Now, I am certainly no expert in PP but I play around with settings in Lightroom until I get something I find pleasing. It was actually not so easy to work with since there are a lot of hard shadows and high contrast within the detail so it is easy for it to look a mess (not your fault, just the nature of the rock and only my opinion anyway. I am sure someone will tell me if I am wrong)

b5k1oj1.jpg
Click to expand...

That's a good rendition. It's more easy on the eye. I don't believe there is a perfect answer. Just various ways which may be pleasing in their own right.

Thanks for your input.

Kind Regards

Wade Skinner
 
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