Thank you Mike. Just trying to be courteous and not overstep my bounds. Even this rendered version is a little off and too bright or detailed on some posts, but only spent a little time and didn't get too picky. The vegetation colors may be a bit off, but add just a tad to the image. The UHH thumbnail is a little darker than on my monitor. Please view the download for best viewing. Thanks again, Mike.

Even the download is darker than on my monitor, and I do not have the brightness set on high whatsoever.

Best Regards,
Tom

Tom's Rendered Version

(Download)

sab,

I would like to ask if I have permission to post a fairly quick rendition of your image to see if it more to your liking? I tried to keep it looking fairly real, as I do with all my PP'ing. Thanks.

Best Regards,
Tom

John,

Having driven many, many miles at all times of the day & night, I often remember heading west with it being basically dark behind me and light in front of me. Hence, I enjoyed daylight longer when driving west! I also was in and crossed many different time zones, which always kept me on my toes when planning departures and arrivals and planning when driving. Thank you.

Best Regards,
Tom

Dave, thanks for the explanation. Yes, I do understand your 'dependent about which side of the bed you got out of bed in the morning' comment! I am honored to be on your 2d/3d referee short list, so that is a resounding AOK. Thank you Dave.

Best Regards,
Tom

John,

Thank you very much for for explanation. I fully understand the lighting, now, and guess I never even thought about that aspect of the shot or the time it was taken. Seeing that the moon was in the east makes a lot of sense and that you captured the lighting from the setting sun behind you.

Great thinking, and I am pleased to say I learned something today, so it was a very successful day for me thanks to you!

As I had said before, I really like your image and how well it was done, especially taking advantage of all the lighting you captured in the picture and the camera settings The L10 ISO setting really added a bit more light for your capture! Thanks again, John.

Best Regards,
Tom

Voss,

This is really a great shot! With all the paraphenalia in the picture, he is definitely the center of attention, and one's eyes immediately go right to him. He is camoulflaged, but yet he isn't, and he defintely is the center of attention of this image! Fantastic!

Best Regards,
Tom

John,

Aside from what others have already mentioned about the composition, framing, etc., the one thing that just jumps out at me when I first looked at it is the lighting. I love the color and the basic lighting detail, however, it just seems like something is wrong? The moon is supplying the main lighting for the scene, so it is basically back lit, as far as I can tell or what seems natural. Hence, why are the front of the trees so well lit - it just seems quite irregular to me, or backwards. I can see the lighting on the water - that makes sense, but the lighting on the front of the trees seems to be impossible to me unless you had a very strong wide open spotlight shining on them when you took the shot. Am I all wet behind the ears, am I missing something, or what is the story when you shot the image?

I am not trying to be negative about the shot; I actually truly love it and the way it all appears. I love the moon, the focus, the coloring and the tones, the reflection in the water, the lily pads and/or vegetation on the water surface, the Spanish moss hanging naturally from the Cypress trees, and the sky's color, but those trees being so well lit from the camera direction just naturally doesn't make complete sense to me with the moon serving as a main background light - Hmmmm, help me out, please?

Best Regards,
Tom

sab,

In my honest opinion, I believe you need to redo the PP'ing and make your changes selectively. I would also decrease the amount of increased exposure and possibly increase the contrast a little. The roof tops are way too light as well as the foreground, in general, and the clouds really do not look very good or with much definition. I also think the entire processed picture looks much too bluish/'turquoisy' looking on the water and the clouds, so I would tone that down as well.

The vegetation/bushes/trees? look too dark and without any definition as well. Perhaps you can retry it again from scratch from the original shot, possibly use a different image processing program, or actually do it selectively as I mentioned in the beginning? Is the original image a RAW file, jpg, tiff, png, or what format?

Best Regards,
Tom

Hi Walt,

Good seeing you again. I like the pose, and the lighting looks pretty good. I think I would have had her extend all her fingers on her camera right hand instead of just the one as if she was pointing at something. Hands and fingers are always difficult to work with in an image. I do like her derriere which is subtle, but quite eye catching in the image. In the download, and then enlarged, the sharpness of her face seems to come out much better. I was going to say she wasn't focused very well until I did the download and then enlarged it. The one thing missing, which is needed, are the catchlights on her eyes. I think I see a hint of catchlights, but not strong at all! Did you use an off camera flash and just misplaced the light(s) a bit, or just used natural light?

Best Regards,
Tom

Dave,

I just looked at both with my eyes adjusting to the 3D effect quite easily. Stereoscopic viewing with one's eyes is very interesting and quite rewarding most the time. I used to do that quite often when I was a geologist looking at various images of geologic outcrops, formations, terrain, etc.. Initially, I used a stereoscopic viewer positioned over the image just right, but then learned how to do it without the mechanical viewer and trained my eyes to relax and see the 3D effect without the viewer after a very short learning curve.

The 3D effect is not real strong in either set, and I can't decide which set I like the best. Perhaps the bottom pair, since they are larger, but there seems to be just a tad more distortion at the bottom in that set than the top set? I kept going back and forth to each one trying to decide, so I have not yet truly decided. What is your opinion? Thanks for posting and I enjoyed looking at them in 3D.

Best Regards,
Tom

Greetings Ron,

I did number 2 and number 4. They are a little darker or more ominous looking, but I think it is rather fitting for the shots. I selectively made some adjustments, both using the camera raw filter, as well as using various curves layers in photoshop. A little darkening here and a little lightening there, so to speak. I decided to do a little noise reduction in them as well. Also selectively used the high pass filter at the end to give them just a tad of punch, but very little, and may not be noticeable without a comparison image.

Thanks for allowing us to practice our PP'ing skills again. It was great! Love your landscape images form Scotland without a doubt.

Best Regards,
Tom

No. 2 Tom's Rendition

(Download)

No. 4 Tom's Rendition

(Download)

Walt,

Hope you win a contest soon and get that new camera. if you do, you will have to let me know, and/or, let the UHH members know. Congrats again on winning the challenge! When is the next contest? When is the next challenge?

Best Regards,
Tom

Brent,

On my computer screen, the download looks pretty soft to me? Perhaps sharpen it up a bit. If you don't want the entire image to be sharper, do it selectively. Also, I agree that perhaps the orange could be toned down just a tad, unless it is natural the way it shows in the image? Possibly a different color background that shows more contrast to all the orange?

Best Regards,
Tom

Since the picture has already been taken, just do the WB selectively, say in PS, and that small challenge is solved. White snow and sky remains blue.

Best Regards,
Tom

Walt,

Congratulations. Did you submit and win with the PP'd version? Did they make any comments about it when you found out you won, or before? What were your winnings . . . only if you want to say . . . just curious. If you don't want to say, I fully understand.

Nice job, Walt!

Best Regards,
Tom