New Bern Bear

This is another shot from our trip to North Carolina. New Bern, North Carolina’s colonial capital was founded in 1710 by Baron Christopher de Graffenried of Bern, Switzerland. The city flag has a black bear motif that dates back to the middle ages. Bears are everywhere in this town from carvings on sidewalks and between the small shops, team mascots at the local schools, and even crawling out the tops of buildings as in this shot. The carving itself is a bit hokey but I really enjoyed the effect and the hometown feel. There was one of these bears emerging from all four corners of the building.

Going from the bustling, over-crowded Houston, with its 6 million bad driving and rude, impersonal inhabitants, to this small, peaceful, southern coastal community where everyone knows everyone else, was a tremendous breath of fresh air. My wife and I both want to live here someday.

I loved NC as well, make a point to visit the outerbanks, Ocracoke etc., you won't regret it! Talking about black bears, yeah had some run ins with those chaps myself. LOLOLOL

As for the picture, can I make a suggestion?

Do that again from scratch, I think you opened up the shadows too much for my taste. Here is one way of doing it.

Open the RAW file, assuming Photoshop on a PC, press CTRL J to copy to new layer, now change mode to LAB, it will suggest to flatten the layer, just say DO NOT flatten and press enter, then APPLY IMAGE. By Default it will be in blending mode multiply, change that to SOFT LIGHT and choose channel a. Press enter and see the difference in colors. You can activate and deactivate the second layer to see the difference.

Now, with second layer activated, clic into the CHANNELS TAB. and activate only the Lightness, your picture turns black and white, and now choose shadow highlights and use parameters that you find suitable. Then activate all channels again to see the result.

Just a suggestion.

James

just for the historical records, Bern in CH has still the Bärengraben, with 5 bears, inside. Bär = bear....

Bern, the capital of Switzerland still has the bear in its crest.

Thank you Georg. I tried your suggestion...at least to the best of my ability...and the result is definitely different. I don't really like it as much but as you stated yourself, those things are usually subject to personal preference. I'm not really sure of what I was actually doing. My photoshop skills are terribly lacking. I am working on that though through Kelby Training. For what it's worth, here is my attempt. Doing it this way I was unable to bring out the detail in the bear as much. I doubt that I was doing it correctly.

We did not get to Ocracoke but we did go out to Cape Lookout. We only had the one day at the Outer Banks. I look forward to going back when we can spend more time there.

Michael, thank you for the added information. New Bern's city flag looks very much like your crest.

James Newman

.....looks to me as if you got the s/h wrong, at a glance without trying it myself, try 25/12 in s and 8/70 in h, should improve.... if s are still too unpronounced increase, you gotta try yourself to find the best fit....

~^..^~