Thanks for contributing, Billy. I'd agree with what you're saying about removing haze altogether, but one thing haze does is leave things a bit on the bright side, and I'd say your edit would benefit from having the mountains darkened a smidge. Knock-out sky, though :thumbup: .

Thank you Angela. No problems with depth here. And the sky's very effective and appropriate for the scene.

Sorry, can't answer. I don't use LR to send. My usual procedure is to upload from the destination end. I just make sure I have a suitably-sized file in the folder that I export from.

It's taken me till now (better late than never) to realise that you seem to have softened the background and left the closer stuff un-softened and detailed - much in the style that we discussed previously.

Great job on the sky, Jim-Pops. I think the haze creates an impression of distance because it's what we're used to seeing. The up-side is that the detail behind the haze can be seen more clearly.

If you're trying to send a file that's too big for the internet destination it will result in a failed upload.

You don't need to worry about finding specific values of resolution. The simplest way is to check the box beside "Limit file size to" then choose a suitable value for your purposes.

In the snip I have 3000K ( = 3MB) because that's the setting I use for exporting to UHH when I want "Download" enabled. But for uploading on the internet I limit file size to 2000K (2MB) because that's a commonly requested file size limit.

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I see you found some details and colour in the clouds, Don. And a bit of de-haze?

(I'd call you DNG, but that would just get plain confusing :-) ).

Nice sky, Shellback.

As shot, the sky's a bit flat. However, there is cloud detail in there to be brought out. Or perhaps you think a new sky is called for. Feel free to edit this in whatever way you think works best.

I'll post a link to a DNG under the JPG.

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JPG.

(Download)

Link to DNG file.
Attached file:
(Download)

#1

The main point is whether the highlights were blown or not. If they were, you'll have to resort to some very careful cloning (probably at much reduced opacity) just to get some data into the blown areas.

If the highlights aren't blown you'll obviously have to darken them, and the best way to do that is to lead with the Highlights slider (or some equivalent). It sounds like the sort of shot that would benefit from a global highlights reduction, but there'll be a limit to how far you can go with that. Beyond that you'll have to make careful selections of the highlights, and if you can, use feathering to match the rate of fall-off of the glare. Hard-edged selections won't work well with that sort of intense fall-off of light. Once you've made your selections you'll be able to make local adjustments that are less limited than the global ones.

Something I do a lot to selections is to lift the Shadows, lower the Highlights (both to the maximum) then use the Brightness slider as required. With the highlights and shadows subdued, any changes to the overall brightness are more likely to stay unnoticed and blend in more convincingly.

What you're seeing as a focus issue is a shutter speed issue. Too slow a shutter speed and the subject will be soft regardless of how good or bad the focus was. A bit of motion blur on the legs won't look wrong and some might say it's a desirable thing, but if the whole subject is moving and there's camera movement on top of that, you need a fast shutter speed to prevent overall softness.

You say you went for a surreal kind of look - I'd say it looks like you captured the swamp on a really good day. Superreal rather than surreal (my favourite kind of editing).

I'll take it as a good sign that work is keeping you busy (and not the neighbour's cats lol).

The depth in the shot was intentional. I knew that if the weather wasn't favourable I'd have to work what I had, and when I saw that lit-up glen I knew I just needed a foreground subject to work with. Eye-catching backgrounds and attention-grabbing foreground subjects can work well together. That's the good thing about landscapes - the whole shot is the subject :-) .