Shot from an Airplane - how to process?

[travelpat]

I took a couple of shots while approaching Vientiane and although the weather was generally clear, it was still hazy and the window wasn't the cleanest either. This is the shot SOOC


Laos unprocessed by TravelPatrick, on Flickr

I made the following adjustment in Lightroom:
- crop
- white balance (8000/10)
- blacks 45
- contrast 50
- tone curve: hightlights 45, lights 0, darks -60, shadows 0
and came up with this:


Laos processed by TravelPatrick, on Flickr

It looks better but still very ... artificial. It's washed out, has a blueish tint, the clouds are strange and what else.

Is there any hope? Do you have ideas on how to further improve this shot? Do you have a standard procedure for shots from an airplane?

[ArmySoldier777]

Well, with images that tend to end up looking flat due to haze, clouds, distance, whatever the case. I go into the curves adjustment tool and take down the shadows while bumping up the highlights to give it more of a detailed look. Messing with the curves adjustment, allowed me to get the result posted below. But keep in mind that if you're working with an original Raw file, your results can be a lot better.


David

[travelpat]

That looks better already, thanks a lot.

[Doug Pardee]

Here's one run through LightZone. The major operation was a White Balance tool set to 9500K with blend mode=Multiply. That blend mode significantly adds contrast by darkening the darker shades, of which there were almost none in the original.

On top of that I added an SLR Sharpen style, then a ZoneMapper to open up the overly-darkened shades from the Multiply blend mode. Then a USM tool used in a deep Local Contrast mode with radius=65 and amount=20. Finally a Hue/Saturation tool with Luminosity=40 to further lighten things up and Saturation=25 to give the colors a bit more life.

Oh, and a rotate/crop to straighten the apparent horizon. That's a judgment call in this photo, because the horizon is hidden.

I probably over-cooked the Local Contrast.

[Doug Pardee]

This one's a bit less harsh. Again with LightZone:

• Hue/Saturation tool, Blend Mode=Soft Light, Luminosity=35
• White Balance tool, Temperature=8500
• Relight tool, Shadows=3, Highlights=0.4, Detail=4, Depth=64
• Midtone Sharpening style, Amount=80

The key steps are the first one, which dramatically increases the tonal range of the image, and the second, which removes the blue cast and reveals the golden sky.

[travelpat]

Thanks Doug, I'll see what I can do with Hue/Saturation in Lightroom.