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What Can You Do With This Pic?

Kevin Stecyk

New member
It was about 1 pm or so in Banff. As you can see, it was a dreary looking day. This photo is straight out of the camera. What can you do with this photo? Go ahead and take your best shot and post your results.

I haven't done anything with this photo yet. I will, however, participate and show my version soon.

Here's the link to the files: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/mrj86irbkn3pq7s/I_Q3RoW_-Y

I will leave the files up for a couple or few days.

131006-banff-khs-24-70-1317-1200px.jpg
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Kevin,

Just to get the ball rolling. Will do more with the downloaded original too.




131006-banff-khs-24-70-1317-1200px.jpg


Original


I've made the picture more contrasty bringing out the ominous clouds and importance of the mountain at the expense of the middle.


131006-banff-khs-24-70-1317-1200px.jpg


Edited ADK
 

Kevin Stecyk

New member
That's an interesting take Asher. I like your clouds, and mine will be similar, though more blue.

It's a difficult picture, isn't it? It's kind of a dreary day with no motivated light. Yet, for some people this might be an important vacation. So they want to capture the beauty that they remember.
 

Kevin Stecyk

New member
Here's my series of photos.

Starting with...

131006-banff-khs-24-70-1317-1200px.jpg

And here's my final version...

131006-banff-khs-24-70-1317-final-1200px.jpg

And here's my mark-up...

131006-banff-khs-24-70-1317-markup-1200px.jpg

Let me discuss my mark-up and go from there.

In my view, the real action is the location, and not the clouds. People who vacation in Banff want to show and tell others about where they've been. Dramatic clouds can happen anywhere.

So I wanted to bring out more colors and more color differentiation. Starting on the left hand side, I wanted more attention to the golden leaves. Moving clockwise across the street, I wanted to bring out color and detail in the trees. Notice how the different trees are colored slightly differently. Going across the street, the same thing. I wanted to draw out color and color differentiation. The Larch trees are turning color, so it is important to tease out that color. Even the traffic light now has some action in it, which is good.

In the center of the picture is the downtown core of Banff. Extra color and vibrancy is good, but it is too far in the distance to place too much emphasis.

In the immediate foreground, I wanted to draw out more color and detail of the plants going horizontal across the fence path. And I wanted to bring out the red color in the plant at the center post. It's already October and Banff is high in altitude, so it has likely already experienced early morning frosts. So the plants might not look their best at this time of year. But I want them to look as good as possible.

The original sky I am ambivalent about. My sky is too dramatic. It steals some attention from the more important parts of the picture. If I were to spend more time--I spent about five minutes--I would reduce the impact of the sky. My sky should be more muted.

Stuart's version and my version are closely related. If some find my version a bit too loud, a blend between Stuart's and mine might be a good mix. I like Stuart's sky better than mine.

By the way, here the Google Map location is found here.

Lat: 51°10'18.526"N
Long: 115°34'16.733"W
Altitude: 1391m
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Kevin,

Thanks for sharing your own detailed ideas on the build of the picture. What's the significance of the garden in the foreground. could you dispense with that and the tour bus?

Asher
 

Kevin Stecyk

New member
Thanks for sharing your own detailed ideas on the build of the picture. What's the significance of the garden in the foreground. could you dispense with that and the tour bus?

The fence sets the frame for the picture. In front of the fence and toward the camera are the Administration Grounds. Behind the fence and toward the mountain are the main interests of the picture. The garden along the fence exists, so I leave it alone in the sense I have no desire to remove it. Any plant life should be spruced up, otherwise it will look odd seeing some colorful trees and bland looking vegetation. The tour bus is an eyesore as far as the picture goes. So is the sign on the fence, an even bigger eyesore, in my opinion. One could be patient and wait for the tour bus to leave. I think it would be too hard to attempt to clone out. At least, I wouldn't be bothered to clone it out--and lots of luck to those who want to try. However, one is likely stuck with the sign, at least for a while. This picture was taken on a Sunday, when the administration building was closed. Perhaps when everything is open, the sign is removed, just because it is an eyesore. I don't know what was written or shown on the sign.

This picture is far from ideal. The sign and the bus pretty much kill this photo from being very good. However, for some tourist, this shot might be all that he has to work with. So, I thought I would open this photograph up for discussion. How would others approach it? I wouldn't give it more than 15 minutes work, tops. It simply isn't worth it. But I am willing to spend a few minutes to take a dull looking picture and add some interest to it.
 

Andrew Molitor

New member
Good treatment on the mountain, you've pushed some real visual drama into it with a lot of local contrast. This looks "fake" but we're trained to accept it as realistic on mountains and landscape, so it looks good.

Applying the same treatment as well as heightened saturation to the foreground material was, to my eye, a mistake. Applying that much local contrast and saturation boost to people, streets, and buses, makes them look fake - but we're not trained to accept it, so it does not look that great.

Further, there's a lack of visual heirarchy here. The foreground, the background, the bus, the people. the mountain, the street, it's all pretty much in your face and equally important. Where am I supposed to look? What are you trying to show me here?
 

BJ Anderson

New member
Good treatment on the mountain, you've pushed some real visual drama into it with a lot of local contrast. This looks "fake" but we're trained to accept it as realistic on mountains and landscape, so it looks good.

Applying the same treatment as well as heightened saturation to the foreground material was, to my eye, a mistake. Applying that much local contrast and saturation boost to people, streets, and buses, makes them look fake - but we're not trained to accept it, so it does not look that great.

Further, there's a lack of visual heirarchy here. The foreground, the background, the bus, the people. the mountain, the street, it's all pretty much in your face and equally important. Where am I supposed to look? What are you trying to show me here?


Andrew,

I really appreciate your honest assessment which I have found value in. Having an understanding of your perspective, of my response, to the presentation, truly makes sense to me.

With some of versions of the photo my eyes were first drawn to the beautiful yellow colored tree. It has amazing color and should not, in my opinion, be what the audience sees at first glance. Of course, this is all subjective because this is how I saw the scene and not necessarily how anyone else will see it.

In all honesty I wasn't 100% sure how to find order in this scene. As a result my goal was to balance the scene, to a certain degree, as to not be dominant in one particular area over another. Obviously, in your eyes, this didn't strike a cord with your sensibility. Again, I appreciate your honesty. When looking at this photo I didn't want the tree to be dominant however I didn't want the mountains to be dominant right off the bat either. There is a lot going on, that in totality, adds to the persona of the scene. If this was a capture that didn't incorporate a small city with cars, buildings and etc than, sure, make the mountains the first thing the audience sees. However I felt that you would ruin the illusion if the mountains stole attention of the scene at first glance.

I attempted to achieve balance by darkening the yellow colored tree as well as the other trees, grass, fence and rock fence post in the front. For what ever reason the bus wasn't in harmony with the overall composition so I instinctively canceled that out in my minds eye. I wanted the eye of the viewer to be drawn to the middle of the scene, the lighter color concrete street/bridge, and then, slowly, the viewer's eyes would be drawn up to the mountains and lastly the sky. Given the busy nature of this scene this was how my sensibility computed the artistic maze of the presentation. I may be guilty of mis-interpreting and/or the execution of my recipe to find order in the scene however I wanted to insure that I stayed true to the initial response that I felt when first taking in the presentation.

At any rate, I very much enjoyed the experience and the dialog.

Happy capturing!

BJ
 
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