Autumn colors [Archive] - Open Photography Forums

Cem_Usakligil

October 14th, 2008, 02:11 PM

Hi folks,

What? No Autumn colors to share?

I'll kick off, looking forward to your contributions:

http://www.xs4all.nl/~bvdwolf/temp/OPF/Autumn1739.jpg

Image uncropped, added a bit of a vignette to focus attention on the trees.

Have fun,
Bart
Hi Bart,

There was another thread by Ron here (http://openphotographyforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7181), and yet another one by Lorenz here (http://openphotographyforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7171) earlier today. But we have to have even more, I agree with you fully. :-)

What strikes me first in this image is the crispness of it. I am assuming that you've shot it with your 1ds Mk II using some serious glass, didn't you? Also knowing your skills in sharpening, the picture must have been sharpened in the best possible fashion. The end result is technical excellence.

Composition wise, this is a simple but a very stable composition. I see two triangles standing on a common base, the smaller one on the left hand side formed by the red leaved tree. The trees manage to hold attention.

But the main power of the picture is -of course- the color of it. This one would not go well in B&W ;-)

Cheers,

Bart_van_der_Wolf

October 14th, 2008, 03:30 PM

Hi Bart,

There was another thread by Ron here (http://openphotographyforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7181), and yet another one by Lorenz here (http://openphotographyforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7171) earlier today. But we have to have even more, I agree with you fully. :-)

I just saw Ron's thread ! Had I seen it earlier, I wouldn't have started a new thread, just added to it. Maybe the threads can be merged into a color fiesta. Lorenz's image is a real beauty. I just hadn't read all of the posts yet, I've been too busy, too little time, but had been wanting to post mine for some time.

What strikes me first in this image is the crispness of it. I am assuming that you've shot it with your 1ds Mk II using some serious glass, didn't you? Also knowing your skills in sharpening, the picture must have been sharpened in the best possible fashion. The end result is technical excellence.

Thanks, you're right about the 1Ds2, with a TS-E 45mm f/2.8 to control the focal plane. However, at this size any camera should be able to produce such crispness. I used FocusMagic on a Luminosity blended sharpening layer to revive the downsampled image, just a quicky on default settings. The crispness also attempts to convey the colder air and brittle leafs and branches that are characteristic of the season.

Composition wise, this is a simple but a very stable composition. I see two triangles standing on a common base, the smaller one on the left hand side formed by the red leaved tree. The trees manage to hold attention.

Yep. It's based on (many) triangles, suggesting stability/rest. It also uses the color contrast to accentuate foreground and background differences, depth, with the emphasis on the lower left (where the eye should begin, and return). I added a subtle vignette to reduce the risk of the eye being drawn out of the image by the bright sky.

But the main power of the picture is -of course- the color of it. This one would not go well in B&W ;-)

LOL. Well, capturing 'autumn/fall' in a B&W is quite a challenge, although I'd welcome contributions that attempt to do just that. Yet, I'm glad that the setting sun helped my image.

Bart

Edward Bussa

October 14th, 2008, 07:02 PM

LOL. Well, capturing 'autumn/fall' in a B&W is quite a challenge, although I'd welcome contributions that attempt to do just that. Yet, I'm glad that the setting sun helped my image.

Well, except for this first image, which might be a candidate for a B&W fall image, I finally welcome a reason to crank up the saturation on my images!!! =D

We went north to Traverse City over the weekend...

http://www.threadster.com/opf/fall2008-1.jpg

http://www.threadster.com/opf/fall2008-2.jpg

http://www.threadster.com/opf/fall2008-3.jpg

http://www.threadster.com/opf/fall2008-4.jpg

Michael Fontana

October 16th, 2008, 03:47 PM

Some autumn colors, too, maybe a bit different than Bart thought:

zoomify (http://imago.macbay.de/zoomchu%CC%88pfen/Berg_Okt_08.htm)

Due to server bandwith, I' ll leave it for a day, or so.
It's a 21-image-stitch, with the Planar 50/Contax.

Edward Bussa

October 16th, 2008, 05:48 PM

amazing detail - gives a different perspective on how photography can be created and enjoyed!

Nicolas Claris

October 16th, 2008, 11:46 PM

Michael
this image is fantastic!
Du pur bonheur !

Now I feel cold ;-)

Michael Fontana

October 17th, 2008, 01:58 AM

Edward

zoomifying these panos is IMHO the best way to show'em on screen; they wouldn't really work as a lets say 1000 pix-image.

Bonjour Nicolas

right, it was a bit cold ;-)
the mountain hasn't sun for about 4 monthes/year, so even in August, there's some snow on it.

I'd have liked to have stitched that image, from the first day :

http://imago.macbay.de/pano_08/snow.jpg

But wenn coming up, we were late, as we had to carry the equipement through the snow, (and I was at a party the night before) so there wasn't enough time to set up the panohead and capture all 21 shots.

Anyway, it's a mid-therm project, so some 4 - 5 other characters of that mountain will follow through the next years, the wall being a strong vis - a - vis to the humain. All will be stitched for huge, high-rez (print) output.

Edward Bussa

October 17th, 2008, 04:55 AM

How much attention do you have to pay to moving elements, such as distinct cloud formations? It appears that probably wasn't too much of a concern for this image, but is it something you think about in other situations and are there any "better" strategies for dealing with them?

Michael Fontana

October 17th, 2008, 05:16 AM

You' re right, Edward

for the zoomify, moving clouds weren't a big problem.
But for the summer panos (http://www.openphotographyforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6734) - with the fast moving haze, it was quite different.

So here's what can be done, and that's one reason I like PTGui, with its manual adjustements:

- deleting manually the CP (Controll Points) in the cloud area. This will stop the other image parths to become distorted.

- if this is still not giving good results, the pano might be rendered as a multilayer file, with each frame as a single layer. Adding a layer mask in PS will result in a smooth and quick correction.

Ron Morse

October 17th, 2008, 09:54 AM

What nice shots, all of them.

The mountain looks cold. I'm not ready for winter yet.

janet Smith

October 20th, 2008, 09:07 AM

http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa318/JanGlenelg/IMG_0025cleanSS001.jpg

Kniphofia, almost dead, but the bees/wasps still love them

http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa318/JanGlenelg/IMG_0045cleanJS.jpg
I love to be under trees looking up into the canopy, wish you could smell the grass and leaves and fresh air, funny some photographs bring the fragrance back to me.....

Sean DeMerchant

October 20th, 2008, 11:48 AM

Hi folks,

What? No Autumn colors to share?

I'll kick off, looking forward to your contributions:

The old bridge to the Grove of the Patriarchs, Mt. Rainier National Park, USA. This is in the lowlands of the park on the South-East side.

(http://www.envisagement.com/tag/grove-of-the-patriarchs/)http://www.envisagement.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/spe26568_acr4_2.jpg (http://www.envisagement.com/tag/grove-of-the-patriarchs/)

Fall Color

Tom Robbins

October 21st, 2008, 04:20 AM

Bart_van_der_Wolf

October 21st, 2008, 04:44 AM

A footbridge over a canyon near the Illinois River in North Central Illinois, taken a couple of weeks ago when the leaves were just getting the notion to turn.

Hi Tom,

That's a nice image. May I suggest 2 things to try.

1. This image is a nice example of the hugely different effect it scores when just flipping it horizontally. Personally I like it better when flipped (maybe that says something about me http://www.openphotographyforums.com/forums/images/smilies/wink.gif).
2. You might want to experiment a bit with a very large radius USM technique, to add some more 'depth' in the darker areas.

Bart

Tom Robbins

October 21st, 2008, 10:30 AM

Thank you Bart,

I don't think I've ever flipped an image. It would seem that a mirror image (flipped, if I understand correctly) would have the same strengths or weaknesses as the original, but the idea is an interesting one. I will certainly explore this possibility.

The large radius USM technique to increase global contrast was used with this image after resizing for the web, but I almost always use too little strength for fear of overdoing the effect. Your observation regarding its use in this photo is on the money.

Also thanks for your recent comments and advice regarding how to downsize an image. Much food for thought and much inspiration for experimentation.

Regards,

Tom

Edward Bussa

October 21st, 2008, 12:17 PM

Very Large Radius USM Technique? To add depth to darker areas? How is it that I've never heard of this before? :)

Intuitively, I understand the concept. Are there any details to it?

Asher Kelman

October 21st, 2008, 05:18 PM

http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa318/JanGlenelg/IMG_0025cleanSS001.jpg

Kniphofia, almost dead, but the bees/wasps still love them

Janet,

Can you show off the busy bee a little more?

Asher

JohnZeman

October 21st, 2008, 07:29 PM

Bart_van_der_Wolf

October 22nd, 2008, 07:01 AM

Very Large Radius USM Technique? To add depth to darker areas? How is it that I've never heard of this before? :)

Intuitively, I understand the concept. Are there any details to it?

Okay, rather than using the Unsharp Masking filter (USM) in an application like Photoshop or similar to sharpen the edges in an image, you can use a very large e.g. 50-100 radius and a low amount of 10-30. This tends to enhance general local contrast without noticable halo. The best values vary with image size and personal preference.

This concept can be enhanced by applying this on a duplicate (luminosity blending) layer, even with advanced blend-if settings to avoid clipping. I generally start with splitting the Black- and White points of the lower layer of the Blend-if dialog to 0-127 and 128-255, and tweak from there.

Bart

Cem_Usakligil

October 23rd, 2008, 12:53 PM

Hi Bart,

Finally I can share some. After I got my camera back, today was the first opportunity to go out and shoot some. So here's what I could come up with, I hope you'll like it. C&C welcome as usual.

http://www.usakligil.com/photo/fora/opf/autumn4.jpg

http://www.usakligil.com/photo/fora/opf/autumn3.jpg

Cem_Usakligil

October 23rd, 2008, 03:50 PM

Well, except for this first image, which might be a candidate for a B&W fall image, I finally welcome a reason to crank up the saturation on my images!!! =D

We went north to Traverse City over the weekend...

http://www.threadster.com/opf/fall2008-1.jpg

http://www.threadster.com/opf/fall2008-4.jpg

Hi Ed,

"Very nice pictures" I have been wanting to say for a few days and then I got distracted. Better late than never, eh? The first one is special indeed. Did you do a B&W version of it?
But of all 4, I like the last one the most. Great composition, color wise as well as structurally.

Cheers,

Edward Bussa

October 23rd, 2008, 03:54 PM

Wonderful, I'll be running down those details soon in an image near me!

janet Smith

October 24th, 2008, 03:52 AM

Janet,

Can you show off the busy bee a little more?

Asher

Hi Asher

http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa318/JanGlenelg/IMG_AsherV1.jpg

Thank you very much for sending this through to me, I like what you've done very much, I'm going to go back to the original file and work on it some more, I have lots of similar ones, the air was absolutely buzzing with loads of small bees and hornets, intent on getting the last of the nectar from these plants, I managed to get several with the bees nice and sharp mid flight, I'll try and get time to work on some more of them perhaps later today, or over the weekend. Many thanks for your time, input and ideas, as always very much appreciated......

Alain Briot

October 24th, 2008, 11:25 AM

One from this past week. We were there at the peak of the end of the fall color for that area :-)

http://beautiful-landscape.com/OPP/Sierra-Fall.jpg

P45 on Hasselblad V. Multiple frame collage with extensive color enhancement work.

Alain Briot

October 24th, 2008, 11:33 AM

Color detail from Sierra Fall:

http://www.beautiful-landscape.com/OPP/Sierra-Fall-color-detail.jpg

Edward Bussa

October 24th, 2008, 08:56 PM

Thanks for the feedback Cem - I was pleased with my thought process on the color and structural composition in #4 and I value your affirmation.

I tried a B&W conversion and struggled with the tonality. Here, I gave it another try:

http://www.threadster.com/opf/fall2008-5.jpg

I put a graduated neutral density filter (LR2) on sky/horizon and was happier with it...

Ed.

janet Smith

October 30th, 2008, 07:05 AM

I don't think I have ever seen such intense Autumn colouring as in this beautiful Acer with it's feathery leaves. Hope you like it.....

http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa318/JanGlenelg/IMG_0109SSJS.jpg

Ron Morse

October 30th, 2008, 08:29 AM

A lot of beautiful colors here.

I think that is a really neat picture Janet.

janet Smith

October 30th, 2008, 03:24 PM

I think that is a really neat picture Janet.

Hi Ron

Thank you for commenting, I found it difficult to get an interesting shot out of the blaze of colour, it can easily become just one big mass of colour, it was very breezy so it was challenging, glad you like it....

Asher Kelman

October 30th, 2008, 04:24 PM

This is what it looked like about 2 weeks ago near Copper Harbor Michigan (up near the end of the Keweenaw Peninsula).

While I did enhance them a bit in Lightroom the colors really were that intense up there. To the point where it almost hurt the eyes to look at them on that rainy day.

http://pionet.net/~karpet/photos/2008-1008-115928.jpg

John,

A thrilling sight! What a road to go on. The yellow lines and the car to the left make the picture personal to a journey. This is an inspiring picture for anyone working on a long tough project. It provides immediate satisfaction, while expressing the reality that the road ahead is long and unknown and in the meanwhile "Let's make the most of this rich life!" Interestingly, we realize that the road ahead is the road we have taken. That implies accountability and gives us some idea that we might be able to control our destiny.

I like art, like this that penetrates between the seconds on the clock, squeezes them apart and inserts moments when time is not measured, entertaining our sense with an array of feelings and sensory pleasure. I hope you post more of these. This alone, made my day great!

Asher

Asher Kelman

October 30th, 2008, 04:34 PM

Beautiful photos of a beautiful time of year.

http://www.pbase.com/salty_one/image/104111577.jpg

A footbridge over a canyon near the Illinois River in North Central Illinois, taken a couple of weeks ago when the leaves were just getting the notion to turn.
Hi, Tom,

Sitting by a window in California, with just a few golden trees beyond the evergreen ficus hedge and then tall palms with roosting black crows, I really miss the generous fully committed fall season we had in Massachusetts. So I really like pictures of fall, even like this when it's just starting.

Bridges with a road to infinity are interesting and immediately capture attention. Here you take us from a zone of shaded foreground with fallen leaves through open light and then beyond that a meandering path through a gap in the distant faded light. The bright light signifies to me opportunity. The distance uncertainty*. There is an pastoral air to the picture and the effect is reassuring and calming.

The changing light in the scene would make a great print that would be revisited. This is for someone thoughtful!

Asher

*No changes are need really. Still, I like to think of how the picture has inherent features that might be made to work more effectively.

The colors of the leaves on the ground are rich already but perhaps might be locally enhanced and individually sharpened selectively to make them like fallen slivers of gold. Would you consider re-lighting the distant path, but enhancing it's interesting shadows) to make it just a touch more obvious to first glance? Also the trees above the most well lit part of the bridge could be retouched to convey the filtered light beams coming through those leaves to shine on the already lit road.

Asher Kelman

October 30th, 2008, 05:10 PM

Color detail from Sierra Fall:

http://www.beautiful-landscape.com/OPP/Sierra-Fall-color-detail.jpg

Taking pictures of sunlit scenes with wide dynamic range and delicate colors is a challenge. So thanks so much Alain for showing the P45 color detail. is this 100%? Is there more to see such as a close up of a bunch of leaves?

When you do this, it provides the greatest possible understanding, (without seeing prints) of what the camera can achieve. I hope more folks can do this as any camera can take a pretty picture but for detail scenes with rich colors these better systems are the way to go, short of large format film.

http://beautiful-landscape.com/OPP/Sierra-Fall.jpg

© Alain Briot P45 on Hasselblad V. Multiple frame collage

How many pictures went into the composite and what lens did you use? Are you setting up a tripod or working freehand? Also was the bright foreground a particular challenge and did you need bracketed exposures? Could you have done this same picture in the past with film? If so how?

Asher

JohnZeman

October 31st, 2008, 04:06 PM

John,

A thrilling sight! What a road to go on. The yellow lines and the car to the left make the picture personal to a journey. This is an inspiring picture for anyone working on a long tough project. It provides immediate satisfaction, while expressing the reality that the road ahead is long and unknown and in the meanwhile "Let's make the most of this rich life!" Interestingly, we realize that the road ahead is the road we have taken. That implies accountability and gives us some idea that we might be able to control our destiny.

I like art, like this that penetrates between the seconds on the clock, squeezes them apart and inserts moments when time is not measured, entertaining our sense with an array of feelings and sensory pleasure. I hope you post more of these. This alone, made my day great!

Asher

Wow Asher, what kind words, thank you. That photo was taken along Highway 41 as we were driving towards Copper Harbor Michigan. The highway towards the end of the peninsula becomes what they call up there, a covered highway, I assume the covered refers to the dense cover of trees. It really is an incredibly colorful drive when the leaves are turning and practically every photo I took on the Keweenaw Peninsula had colors like that. As a result, I hesitate to post another as it'll look fairly similar, instead I'll post one taken towards the end of the day when the sun finally came out while we were visiting the Lake of the Clouds in Porcupine Mountains State Park, which is again in Upper Michigan.

http://pionet.net/~karpet/photos/2008-1008-172528.jpg

I'd like to thank Cem for posting that first photo of the single leaf, that one really inspired me to go out and attempt to take a few similar photos around here while we still have a few leaves left. All of the photos have been inspiring. :)

John

Asher Kelman

October 31st, 2008, 05:22 PM

Beautiful photos of a beautiful time of year.

http://www.pbase.com/salty_one/image/104111577.jpg

A footbridge over a canyon near the Illinois River in North Central Illinois, taken a couple of weeks ago when the leaves were just getting the notion to turn.

Hi Tom,

That's a nice image. May I suggest 2 things to try.

1. This image is a nice example of the hugely different effect it scores when just flipping it horizontally. Personally I like it better when flipped (maybe that says something about me http://www.openphotographyforums.com/forums/images/smilies/wink.gif).
2. You might want to experiment a bit with a very large radius USM technique, to add some more 'depth' in the darker areas.

Bart

Hi Bart,

Yes, you are insightful about the horizontal flip of the image. I have to take a leap of faith that we might be thinking about the same psychological effect of the directions of movement. To me, at least, in the "flipped image"(not shown), it seems more positive. However, that's just on first look, since we are moving from left to right as we go deep into the picture. The left to right movement, in our culture does signify progress. However at the distant part of the path, in the flipped version, it would winds to the left, which is not such a good signal as in the original where it goes to the left.

So we have a dilemma! Should we start with a positive psychological impact from the outset by flipping the picture accepting that the path eventually turns left, against progress? Or should accept the original and just "sneak past" the initial "wrong" direction and rejoice that ultimately the path does go in the correct direction?

After first thinking your version was more effective, Bart, I then had to go back to the original since I like good endings. I'm pragmatic but a pragmatic optimist and I'll grab any good sign on the way I can find!

Thanks for bringing up this important issue. Compositional choices such as directions and strength of lines, curves, masses and and placement of fixed objects are among the important clues we embed in our photography. This is a great learning point for us! I hope you will find more cases to point out such structural parameters to be considered in making pictures work.

Asher

Asher

Bart_van_der_Wolf

October 31st, 2008, 06:22 PM

Hi Bart,

Yes, you are insightful about the horizontal flip of the image. I have to take a leap of faith that we might be thinking about the same psychological effect of the directions of movement. To me, at least, in the "flipped image"(not shown), it seems more positive. However, that's just on first look, since we are moving from left to right as we go deep into the picture. The left to right movement, in our culture does signify progress. However at the distant part of the path, in the flipped version, it would winds to the left, which is not such a good signal as in the original where it goes to the left.

Hi Asher,

Yes, I think we're thinking about the same psychological effects. I'm all for a strong captive image, but the subtle conclusion is as valuable.

So we have a dilemma! Should we start with a positive psychological impact from the outset by flipping the picture accepting that the path eventually turns left, against progress? Or should accept the original and just "sneak past" the initial "wrong" direction and rejoice that ultimately the path does go in the correct direction?

No dilemma, just a choice! Do note, it all starts with Tom's deliberate choice to shoot from the left of the road. One could wonder, why? For some reason he chose to do it, I just raised a "what if". I'm not judging, I'm just jogging our minds as to why it seemed a good position. Personally I like the flipped result better, but it's not my image.

I'm probably a lot like Nicolas Claris in the sense that I make conscious desicions about my own compositions. No requirement to crop afterwards, unless I want a more square result than the camera captures, or I couldn't get close enough. I also attempt to choose my leading or exiting diagonals from the onset (unless it poses a risk of getting run over by traffic, or attacked by wildlife ;-) ).

Thanks for bringing up this important issue. Compositional choices such as directions and strength of lines, curves, masses and and placement of fixed objects are among the important clues we embed in our photography. This is a great learning point for us! I hope you will find more cases to point out such structural parameters to be considered in making pictures work.

Thank you, I intend to. It of course also depends on the material being posted, so everybody, keep it coming...

I also intend to post a series on general compositional elements, time and cooperation permitting.

Bart

Alain Briot

October 31st, 2008, 09:17 PM

Taking pictures of sunlit scenes with wide dynamic range and delicate colors is a challenge. So thanks so much Alain for showing the P45 color detail. is this 100%? Is there more to see such as a close up of a bunch of leaves?

When you do this, it provides the greatest possible understanding, (without seeing prints) of what the camera can achieve. I hope more folks can do this as any camera can take a pretty picture but for detail scenes with rich colors these better systems are the way to go, short of large format film.

http://beautiful-landscape.com/OPP/Sierra-Fall.jpg

© Alain Briot P45 on Hasselblad V. Multiple frame collage

How many pictures went into the composite and what lens did you use? Are you setting up a tripod or working freehand? Also was the bright foreground a particular challenge and did you need bracketed exposures? Could you have done this same picture in the past with film? If so how?

Asher

Here's how I do these:

http://www.openphotographyforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5745

I used a normal lens for this 2 images collage (80mm). No bracketing.

Alain Briot

October 31st, 2008, 09:18 PM

Actually since my original post I corrected the color in the image. Here's the new version:

http://beautiful-landscape.com/New%20Site.data/2008%20Images/Sierra-Fall.jpg

Asher Kelman

October 31st, 2008, 09:51 PM

Actually since my original post I corrected the color in the image. Here's the new version:

http://beautiful-landscape.com/New%20Site.data/2008%20Images/Sierra-Fall.jpg

Thanks for the reminder. That's an enjoyable essay! Still could you give us a little cutout of the leaves! That would be great!!

Asher

Alain Briot

October 31st, 2008, 11:52 PM

Thanks for the reminder. That's an enjoyable essay! Still could you give us a little cutout of the leaves! That would be great!!

Asher

There's actually an interesting story about this photograph. It was taken during our Mono Lake & Eastern Sierra workshop a couple weeks ago. We were there during fall colors, and of course some trees were in full colors while others were past their peak and some still fully green.

One participant had spent several days in the area waiting for the workshop to begin, and had visited the location where I took this photograph when the colors were at their peak. When we went there as a group, he told me that it wasn't nearly as good as it was, that it was over, that I should have seen it when it was at its peak, etc. etc.

I answered him by saying "you wouldn't believe how often I heard that".

"What do you mean" he said?

"I mean many beginning photographers have told me exactly what you are telling me. That it was better at a different time, be it yesterday, a month ago, last year, whenever. "

Fact is, I continued, it wasn't necessarily better then and it isn't necessarily worse now. It's simply different."

I then showed him the photograph I was in the process of composing and explained that what attracted me to this scene was precisely the fact that the leaves were past their peak. If the leaves had all been at their peak, the scene would have been filled with yellow color everywhere. Now, since the leaves in the background were brown instead of yellow, it let the small trees in front of the forest stand out. Before they would have been lost among the trees behind them instead of being separated by color as they were now.

I also explained that as they were these small trees stood as survivors, metaphorically, or as the last ones standing, the last of their kind, the fading remnants of what was, just a few days ago, a blaze of color. There was a message there that spoke of endurance and survival.