Cozy cottage

[2stroke]

Cozy cottage with great location needs minor repair...

Enough with the real estate add. This is an old house/shack I have been eyeballing on my drives down the eastern Sierra. I convert very few of mine to black and white but I have been playing around with it in photoshop elements.

My questions:
How is the B&W conversion for you?
Composition. The sticks/weeds in front of the shack distracting?
Can anything be done about the raindrop on lens lower left? Does it matter?
2 cars in shot, remove or dont bother?

This shot processed from single RAW file in PSE-6, no tonemapping HDR work.
Camera Sony DSLR-A300
Exposure 0.008 sec (1/125)
Aperture f/11.0
Focal Length 18 mm
ISO Speed 100
Exposure Bias 0 EV
Flash Off, Did not fire


DSC07072cropBW by 2_stroke, on Flickr

[Preeb]

Originally Posted by 2stroke

Cozy cottage with great location needs minor repair...

Enough with the real estate add. This is an old house/shack I have been eyeballing on my drives down the eastern Sierra. I convert very few of mine to black and white but I have been playing around with it in photoshop elements.

My questions:
How is the B&W conversion for you?
Composition. The sticks/weeds in front of the shack distracting?
Can anything be done about the raindrop on lens lower left? Does it matter?
2 cars in shot, remove or dont bother?

This shot processed from single RAW file in PSE-6, no tonemapping HDR work.
Camera Sony DSLR-A300
Exposure 0.008 sec (1/125)
Aperture f/11.0
Focal Length 18 mm
ISO Speed 100
Exposure Bias 0 EV
Flash Off, Did not fire

The B&W looks good to me. I think that the weeds add to the feeling of decay in the overall composition. It shouldn't be too hard to remove the cars if you wanted to. As for the raindrop, not sure. I'm still learning PSE myself.

[SwissJon]

I'm sure you could get more out of the sky and clouds. Play with the colour levels in the B&W conversion.

I don't have an issue with the weeds, they're not a distraction for me, I think they may have been an issue in colour, but in B&W they enhance. You might want to flip this horizontally. The eye naturally goes from left to right, so if you start your picture with something to draw the attention, then the person viewing it will take in more of the picture. As it is the eye naturally skips over the emptier area and misses the details in the clouds.

I wouldn't have noticed the raindrop if you hadn't pointed at it. Clone it out if you want, but do it in colour, you'll find it easier to blend in if you do your cloning prior to making any changes to anything else..

Same with the cars wouldn't have noticed if you hadn't pointed it out.. But they're likely to be easier to clone out.

[2stroke]

John, thank you for the input.

I am not sure if I can pull more out of the sky, the color version (see on my flickr) had curve put to it before BW convert (which the color version is over saturated from curve). I did do some playing with color levels but the shack and other parts started looking wonky, maybe work the sky and mask. I did do some dodge and burn for highlights/ shadows in the clouds, not sure how far I can go with what I know without getting posterized.

I try some flip pics and see what that does for me.

[2stroke]

I started over with this on the color image focusing on the sky for contrast, then worked the color sliders in the PS BW convert. I am learning the black white conversion so there is lots of trial and error.

The cars on the hwy bothered me a bit so I just selected them and lightened them up to get near the tone of the surrounding trees and rocks, they are a still there, but now they disappear in the B&W.

For the rain drop blur, I did a soft edged selection on the drop and bumped up the contrast to help the haze go away, that minimized it a little.

Added a frame and my sig.


DSC07072bw2 by 2_stroke, on Flickr

[Preeb]

Love the new version. I'm no expert on B&W, but I know what grabs me, and I would definitely hang that one on the wall.

[SwissJon]

Now, what were you saying about not getting any more out of your sky??

Now that's what I like, you come here, learn something and apply it and immediately see a vast improvement in your composition. That's hugely better.. Out of curiosity, did you try flipping it?

[Corey Thompson]

I definitely like the sky in the 2nd one much better. I like how you used the open space in this photo. For me, it kind of gives the photo a ghost town feeling.

[EOBeav]

This is nice, and the edit created a much better overall image. IMO, the B/W conversion, particularly with the contrast, is well done.

[2stroke]

Thank you for the kind words. I am not sure if I have my final image yet I do like the sky in the 2nd edit and the tree behind the house, but I think I am not liking the highlights on the house, maybe work on that area. I have tried a burn on the sticks that are right in the center to take a little brightness off of it but it looked bad.

As for the flip, I did give that a try, but it didnt work for me.

I was looking in google maps to get the location for the pic and noticed the same house in pictures. Search Round Valley, ca if interested.