Stephen Levitas
About the Image(s)
Title: Seattle 80 Degrees
We are just back from our trip to Seattle to see our two children and two grandchildren there. Imagine the happiness of seeing them at last after a year and a half of COVID-19 isolation. The weather was perfect—we were back before the record-breaking heat wave.
We had a picnic on the city’s huge Lake Washington. Days are often clear this time of year, so Mt. Rainier was in full view most of the ten days we were in Seattle. This view is from about 60 miles. 1/500, F4.5, ISO 80, 140mm. I converted to monochrome, experimenting with the presets in my PS Elements—I like the result called “Infrared,” although I see nothing special about it or much different from another called “Vivid Landscape,” which I often use. In keeping with group advice, I increased overall contrast, and then selected just the upper 25% of the image and increased contrast more just there. I am not sure about this result. I often prefer the haziness of the aerial perspective of mountains.
This round’s discussion is now closed!
12 comments posted
My suggestion for the clouds is either use dodge and burn on a separate layer to lighten the clouds, or create a new layer of 50% grey and then use a brush with low opacity to darken and lighten different areas.
Both techniques work well and are simple and if you don't like the effects, then delete the layer.
I felt the tones were too overall grey so I wanted to increase the contrast with curves so here's my version.   Posted: 07/05/2021 06:20:34
Your fix looks better, and the instructions give me a lot to work on and learn.   Posted: 07/09/2021 10:52:21
As I mentioned in comment to Russ, the colored filters can do a wonderful job, or so I read in the Michael Freeman book "Mastering black and white digital photography." I found it to be a fascinating read, not as good as a book by Robert Ludlum, but it presented so many different processes and tools that I was impressed. But: too complicated for me. If I had another ten years, I might give it a try. ISBN if interested is:1-57790-707-5 and probably available used via Biblio.com   Posted: 07/05/2021 09:38:59
I think you are right. I confess to shooting on automatic a lot, and I think the near focus is a bit off.   Posted: 07/09/2021 10:50:44