A Fresh Start - Guatemala the Culture the People

[Robert Watcher]

Some Guatemala Colour - 2 with the human element

Colour #4

Colour #5

Colour #6

​

 

[Asher Kelman]

Some Guatemala Colour - 2 with the human element

Colour #4

Colour #5

Colour #6

​

Robert,

I adore all the pictures here, both for the presence of people but also for the unavoidable draw of the colors that make the decay of buildings not merely irrelevant but also even more impressive!

Can you explain the monumental impact of the colors used?

Is this the result of your processing or is it natural and related to the color preferences of a culture that has used natural pigments and dyes for generations?

Has anyone, to your knowledge documented the nature and etiology of these color choices? Are they just "South Amercian" or are they native to the indigenous peoples that predated Western infusions of foreign culture?

 

[Robert Watcher]

Robert,

I adore all the pictures here, both for the presence of people but also for the unavoidable draw of the colors that make the decay of buildings not merely irrelevant but also even more impressive!

Can you explain the monumental impact of the colors used?

Is this the result of your processing or is it natural and related to the color preferences of a culture that has used natural pigments and dyes for generations?

Has anyone, to your knowledge documented the nature and etiology of these color choices? Are they just "South Amercian" or are they native to the indigenous peoples that predated Western infusions of foreign culture?

For a certainty I enhance my images slightly - but mostly just contrast and structural details that make colours and textures pop a little more - - - - making them look more as I see them or more interesting. But colours are not altered in Hue and even Saturation isn't brought up that much from original JPEG files. The colours here are real, bold and varied from building to building.


So here is an example of one of the pics that you replied to.

The Original on Top is straight out of camera. In my camera I turn off sharpening and reduce contrast a bit to make sure that I have an image to work with.

As can be seen in final Processed image on the Bottom, most of the processing involves adjusting highlights and shadows and bringing out the texture with some clarity or structure adjustment, where that is possible. I love texture and feels that it adds to the mood of the image. These steps do intensify colour a little. And of course I crop in most cases, as I am framing and shooting quickly and worry more that my composition is where it needs to be, than trying to go right to the edge of the frame in-camera:

I couldn't tell you about the history of colour in the countries I am visiting Asher. I love being around the people and their culture and documenting it with my camera as I see it. But photography is my interest. Just capturing what I see.

 

[Robert Watcher]

INTERPRETATIONS ::: SOFT COLOURS OF GUATEMALA

IMAGE #1

IMAGE #2

IMAGE #3


​

 

[Robert Watcher]

STREET CORNER EFFICENCY

 

[Robert Watcher]

Walking around the market last night as everyone was closing up shop, there were lots of cute kids ...

... including this little guy who is privileged to be in a Mr. Egg Playpen.

His parents really splurged obviously - -- and from observing him for several minutes, it appears that he was totally content with that along with his blanket and roll of baler twine - and who know what other packing supplies and hidden treasures.

​

 

[Robert Watcher]

"PEOPLE BEING THEMSELVES - XELA, GUATEMALA" A Subset with different image treatment.

​

 

[Robert Watcher]

Everyone Loves Textures

​

 

[Robert Watcher]

TRADITIONAL KICHE MAYA WEAVING - very time consuming and very expensive to buy.

​

Being an amazing seamstress and quilt maker in her own right, my wife Anne was thrilled to be put into the Leather Harness and given a chance to experience the feeling of this arduous time consuming and physical process. It was definitely a highlight of her Central American adventures.

​

 

[Robert Watcher]

PHOTOS OF THE DAY - we have just come back from spending 2 days at Lake Atitlán with it surrounding mountain Maya towns resembling Mediterranean hillside vistas - as we wound our way through the road in the back of a pickup truck.

THE WEAVERS

THE POTTERS

THE FISHERBOY

SAN ANTONIO, GUATEMALA

​

 

[Asher Kelman]

This is one of the cheapest and most colorful vacations I just enjoyed with you!

I am enthralled with the textures chance breakdown of surfaces and unusual but earthy color combinations. I am simply thrilled!

Asher

 

[Wolfgang Plattner]

Hi

what a precious way to "travel" ... thank you for the impressions of a far away country and its people.

 

[Robert Watcher]

Thank you Asher and Wolfgang

 

[Andy brown]

Robert, I have been enjoying your work for quite some time and don't always comment as such but this latest selection "photos of the day" is excellent.
The Fisherboy talks to me the most.

You're clearly enjoying yourself.

 

[Robert Watcher]

Robert, I have been enjoying your work for quite some time and don't always comment as such but this latest selection "photos of the day" is excellent.
The Fisherboy talks to me the most.

You're clearly enjoying yourself.

I appreciate that. Thank you. With all of our photojournalistic work and travels seeing all parts of Costa Rica and Nicaragua - - - this trip into the mountain towns was special - something that Anne and I haven't experienced as of yet.

 

[Murray Foote]

A wonderful cavalcade of colourful street photography, Robert.

It's of particular interest to me because I'm intending to spend four days in Northern Guatemala near Flores at the end of August, en route to Cuba and some Caribbean destinations.

 

[Robert Watcher]

A wonderful cavalcade of colourful street photography, Robert.

It's of particular interest to me because I'm intending to spend four days in Northern Guatemala near Flores at the end of August, en route to Cuba and some Caribbean destinations.

Thank you for your compliments.

Ooooo - going in the rainy season - get ready for hot, humid and wet in Flores in August. Probably best to consider that in your gear and clothing preparation for those 4 days. Maybe you already have.

While Anne and I are living a long distance away in the South/West part of Guatemala - high in the mountains, and haven't visited the north - - - we had friends (non-photographers) who went there last year in mid-September and really liked the experience - especially with the Mayan Ruins at Tikal. Enjoy.

 

[Robert Watcher]

SCENICS

Lake Atitlan from San Antonio - Mountain Town to the East

Lake Atitlan from Panajachel - Lakeside Town on North

Lake Atitlan from Panajachel - Lakeside Town on North

Volcano Explosion from our Apartment Rooftop - Viewing South

Stunning Misty Mountain View from our Apartment Rooftop - Viewing East


​

 

[Robert Watcher]

PEOPLE

​

 

[Murray Foote]

Thank you for your compliments.

Ooooo - going in the rainy season - get ready for hot, humid and wet in Flores in August. Probably best to consider that in your gear and clothing preparation for those 4 days. Maybe you already have.

While Anne and I are living a long distance away in the South/West part of Guatemala - high in the mountains, and haven't visited the north - - - we had friends (non-photographers) who went there last year in mid-September and really liked the experience - especially with the Mayan Ruins at Tikal. Enjoy.

My timing is predicated by signing up to a photographic tour of Cuba in early September. I hadn't done much of the planning so far. Thanks for the warning about the weather. I've found a place to stay on private land adjoining a Mayan site with pyramids that will be accessible at all hours.

 

[Robert Watcher]

My timing is predicated by signing up to a photographic tour of Cuba in early September. I hadn't done much of the planning so far. Thanks for the warning about the weather. I've found a place to stay on private land adjoining a Mayan site with pyramids that will be accessible at all hours.

I'm sure it will be an amazing experience. Enjoy.

 

[Robert Watcher]

Perty

​

 

[Robert Watcher]

LONG EXPOSURE

I walked downtown to Central Park last night, to capture some of the lights with the architecture. It was a quieter night, and so not a lot of interference from people walking or standing in the way or from a lot of vehicles lining the streets and just enough cars going by for a few nice light trails.

​

 

[Robert Watcher]

I have moved to a new area in the city of Xela, Guatemala over the weekend - and everything is different - new visual stimulation to my eyes.

My daily photography ritual continues with me heading out to the streets early at 6:00 AM, in the freezing cold. Here are a few colour images from this morning:

​

 

[Robert Watcher]

A little fun. I've done similar type images before shooting the same person/s walking through a scene, and then compositing their different positions. And so the opportunity arose again with this man walking by an old earthquake ridden church wall.

I didn't use sequential shooting on my camera - just fired a single shot at different positions of the man. I was initially more interested in just having one good frame with him in a good place - - - but after the fact, I liked each placement and combined them all.

My primary image management and processing platform is Adobe Lightroom. From Lightroom, it is easy to select the group of images and "Open in Layers in Photoshop" in the Edit In menu. Once all images are stacked on top of each other in Photoshop, I can select all layers and under Edit select "Auto Align Layers" - then I am able to apply a mask to each layer and paint-in (expose) the sections that I want into the overall scene. I benefit greatly from the Auto Align Layers feature, because I do not use a tripod. Handholding, creates variation between frames that can be accommodated.

​

 

[Andy brown]

Robert, fantastic images as usual. Your standards are very high and consistent.
I'm glad you talked about your PP in this last one.
I've often wanted to ask you about your approach to PP but because you seem to have such a distinct look, even uniqueness, I've not felt comfortable to ask (I presumed or assumed that you would probably like to keep it to yourself).

Anyway, if you are happy to divulge a little of how you achieve your gritty, earthy 'look', I'd love to know more.

cheers, andy

 

[Robert Watcher]

Robert, fantastic images as usual. Your standards are very high and consistent.
I'm glad you talked about your PP in this last one.
I've often wanted to ask you about your approach to PP but because you seem to have such a distinct look, even uniqueness, I've not felt comfortable to ask (I presumed or assumed that you would probably like to keep it to yourself).

Anyway, if you are happy to divulge a little of how you achieve your gritty, earthy 'look', I'd love to know more.

cheers, andy

I really appreciate your thoughts Andy.

I have no problem sharing my workflow. You will however find that I simply use the same tools almost everyone else does. Just as it is that we can be shooting the same content with the identical camera and lens - - - and our images with look unique to the way we see and visualize - that is the case with processing.

The biggest thing is that it takes much more time to describe how I go about a process, than actually doing it - as well, I'm not always sure what is involved in my process and it is seldom the same image to image.

So I have nothing to protect in my processing methods, for fear someone else with produce my style. LOL.

Lightroom is the program that all of my image files go into. I seldom use Photoshop except for compositing. In my current iteration of processing, I do make use of both Nik Colour Efex Pro and Nik Silver Efex Pro to get certain looks that I am wanting in Guatemala. However with all of my Nicaragua images, I pretty well only used Lightroom tweaks and processing. And yet people comment that my style was the same with my images from Costa Rica, Nicaragua and Guatemala - - - even though I used totally different cameras, lenses and processing methods and even varied them during my lengthy stays, for variety.

So that I don't clog up this thread with technical, I created a new thread that shows some of the basic steps to what may be my most complex processing - composite in Photoshop and tonal adjustments in Color Efex Pro. But quite literally, I don't spend much time. I doubt that I spend more than a minute processing any file.

The Screen Shots hopefully will give you some insight into my methods.

http://openphotographyforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20342



----------------

 

[Andy brown]

Robert, thanks for that.
I'll read the other thread when I have some time (late at night usually).
I'm pleased to hear that you spend minimal time on the PP. I take the same approach but I'm also very aware that I have a long way to go with certain aspects.

 

[Robert Watcher]

​

 

[Robert Watcher]

​