No more white skies

[tameboy]

I edited this image because I wanted to see what was possible. I am fed up with skies that are just white-outs! I am quite pleased with the results...

before


after


All editing done in GIMP. I used a bit of rotation and perspective alteration to get a symmetrical and centred appearance, then put a mask over the sky and used 'levels' to make the foreground brighter.

[Christhephotoguy]

PERFECT... In fact, if I were asked, I would exactly the same thing.

[AnneWynne]

When you can work with a tripod, try Exposure Bracketing to take care of the blown out skies problem.

Nice fix for your image.

[Rolfmaomachizlin]

hey isnt that in a manoir in france?

[PentaxLuver]

Nicely done with GIMP. I agree with Ann about trying bracketing. Another procedure to try is HDR. I use a Pentax K-x with HDR available in camera from three exposures. It seems to work quite well.

[tameboy]

Originally Posted by Rolfmaomachizlin

hey isnt that in a manoir in france?

nope, Castle Howard, near York, UK.

Thanks for the comments guys, I will look into exposure bracketing once I get my tripod fixed!

[janamelinda]

oooh lovely! Nice work! Sometimes I just use a gradient filter on my skies to bring out the clouds a bit. Doesn't work all the time, but sometimes I get a really nice effect! I love this though!

[jayeshbheda]

I am also using GIMP, and found the technique useful!

Have you used used mask on selected region of the sky?

[Krusty79]

You could also try a graduated neutral density filter to get it right in the camera instead of having to PP. Great job, though.

[tameboy]

Krusty

Just looking into filters at the moment. I was thinking about a B+W circular filter for my 17-55mm f2.8 canon, but recently came across the square filters attached by filter holders. These seem a lot cheaper - could get a lot more filters for my money. Anyone have any experience / advice on this subject?

jayeshbheda

I selected the sky - using the free select tool - zooming in a lot helps with accuracy. The scissors select tool can work very well for this sort of thing especially if there is a definite edge for it to find. Once the sky was selected I clicked on the Toggle Quick Mask (bottom left of image window). I then selected Gaussian Blur from the filter menu - I set it to somewhere between 50 and 100 pixels so there isn't too much of a noticeable edge.

Then I clicked on the quick mask toggle button so that I then had the sky selected with a nice blurred transition to the horizon line and edited the levels - you can obviously select inverse to adjust the foreground.

Hope that helps. I have used this technique to help with quite a few images since my early success on this image...