Need help!

[Scooter Pie]

Ok folks, I've been beating my self over the head for the past coupe of days. For some strange reason i can not "pull" the image that i'd like out of this photo. I often open the image up in photoshop and just stare at it lol. Maybe i have some photographers form of writers block?

So I'd like to ask the DPS community to lend me a hand and help me make this image go from great to awesome. You're welcome to save a copy of the image from my flickr and have your way with it in PS - I only ask that you post your end result in the thread.

I really appreciate at advice or direction you guys/gals can spare.

Thanks

Scooter pie



you can snag the original size here:
Nature - f2Photography's Photos
(just mouse over the image and hit the folder icon with the down pointing green arrow to save)

[zona5101]

things i'd try...
crop it. horizon in the middle is less interesting. I'd crop from the top to get rid of some of the sky. Its not adding much and it really imo couldn't be considered "negative space". Need to brighten it as overall it looks underexposed. A bit of vibrance or smidge of saturation increase to bring out the grass. And actually a curves adjustment for exposure should make the grass pop a bit anyway...

[crockny]

I'd crop both the top and bottom - too much white sky and the swamp is uninteresting as is ... basically you'd be making it a landscape rather than portrait photo ... maybe also take out the left and right trees so only the foggy trees are left ... next time try rotating your camera and moving around to see how the scene looks when framed different ways ...

[Scooter Pie]

Thanks for the advice...i shot that scene a number of ways and different angles and i posted the one i felt best to work with

I'll try adding some vibrance/saturation to the image...but there is still something missing...id like to find a filter or a workflow that i can use to give that misty/foggy background some character.

Working on it right now..ill post the update shortly.

thanks again!

[edbayani]

i'd crop the wet portion of the grass where the wet portion starts and some of the white sky.
select the grass with quickmask and with a big, soft brush, brush the lower portion, exit mask and adjust in levels to lighten and reveal the lone duck on the grass

[GTAltman]

Originally Posted by Scooter Pie

Ok folks, I've been beating my self over the head for the past coupe of days. For some strange reason i can not "pull" the image that i'd like out of this photo. I often open the image up in photoshop and just stare at it lol. Maybe i have some photographers form of writers block?

So I'd like to ask the DPS community to lend me a hand and help me make this image go from great to awesome. You're welcome to save a copy of the image from my flickr and have your way with it in PS - I only ask that you post your end result in the thread.

I'm still learning PS, and I'm going to piggyback on this for a followup critique on how I did.

Maybe a bit overcooked...

Gary

[IABoomer]

My take on it. Like crockny said, I saw it as a landscape, not portrait oriented image. Cropped in a little on the left side to remove the distracting closer branches.

I added a graduated filter on the horizon line and brightened up the foreground exposure by about a stop. Bumped the overall exposure about a half stop. Pulled the brightness and contrast down 40 to 50 to get that more flat hazy feel. Added a bit of clarity to bring out some detail to the grass and tweaked the white balance a little to give that cool gray haze.

[zona5101]

Originally Posted by IABoomer

My take on it. Like crockny said, I saw it as a landscape, not portrait oriented image. Cropped in a little on the left side to remove the distracting closer branches.

I added a graduated filter on the horizon line and brightened up the foreground exposure by about a stop. Bumped the overall exposure about a half stop. Pulled the brightness and contrast down 40 to 50 to get that more flat hazy feel. Added a bit of clarity to bring out some detail to the grass and tweaked the white balance a little to give that cool gray haze.

i like this edit! ^^^
Nicely done IABoomer.

[Scooter Pie]

Hey guys thanks again for helping out.

GTAltman..what post processing did you do to get the trees like that? thats what im looking to do with the misty background!

Currently ive made my crop and vibrance/saturation changes so far...almost ready to post the final product

[GTAltman]

Originally Posted by Scooter Pie

Hey guys thanks again for helping out.

GTAltman..what post processing did you do to get the trees like that? thats what im looking to do with the misty background!

Currently ive made my crop and vibrance/saturation changes so far...almost ready to post the final product

For the record, I like Boomers pic too!

Using Photoshop, this is what I did for the trees...
I used the quick selection tool (W) and selected everything above the ground (basically, right across the horizon),and once selected clicked on the Exposure icon and made the following adjustments:
Exposure -0.66
Offset -0.1230
Gamm Correction 1.00