Saint-Emilion
Posted on January 1, 2016
This week’s Black & White Photo Challenge from Cee is for ‘Any kind of bricks or stone walls, roads or walkways’.
All present and correct in this image, taken in the village of Saint-Emilion, one of the centres of wine-making in France’s Bordeaux region.
One Photo Focus: January 2016
Posted on January 1, 2016
For the January One Photo Focus we were given this image by Laura Macky of Laura Macky Photography
It’s an excellent photograph as it stands: a well-composed image of an interesting subject. There seemed little to be gained from tweaking details like saturation; that would be more likely to detract than to enhance. So I decided to take just a part of the whole and turn it into something different.
The angle at which the boat is beached provided some interesting diagonals in the superstructure, so I cropped tightly into the subject itself. Although I like the colours in the original, I felt that it would also work well in black and white. A bit of work on the sliders brought out more detail in the peeling paintwork, giving it a more ‘weatherbeaten’ look.
Lessons learnt
Posted on December 31, 2015
This week, as part of her ongoing Compose Yourself Challenge, Cee Neuner has offered up five of her own photographs for participants to offer a critique and, if they choose, edit themselves. I like to think that I can take it as well as dish it out, so although it seems a little churlish to ‘have a go’ at the work of someone who does so much for the photoblogging community, I’m going to take up the offer. It’s at times like this it’s important to remember that there’s all the difference between critique and criticism.
As Cee points out, all five of these images are straight out of the camera, with no post-processing whatsoever. In my view, there’s something that can be done with three of them, although with ‘Coloured Chairs’ and ‘Taxi Cab’ I’d just be inclined to press ‘delete’ and move on. Perhaps they illustrate Cee’s dictum that you should never take just one photo.
As for the others, I’ve done my own editing on them and present the before and after side by side, with a few notes on what I did and why.
Marina
- Photography 101: Horizons should be horizontal
- The setting sun is blown out, and the rest of the image is underexposed. I cropped out the left hand side to eliminate the glare and also whatever it is at top left (it surely isn’t the subject).
- Moving around the sliders lightened the remaining image, bringing out more detail in the foreground as well as enhancing the colour of the sky.
Red Umbrella
Anything red is pretty much guaranteed to make a good subject (as well as the classic foreground object), but in the original the umbrella is a bit lost somewhere in the middle, so I cropped it to put the umbrellas in the left third of the image, and also bring out the diagonals of the wall and pavement (sorry, ‘sidewalk’). A bit of punch from boosting Clarity and Vibrance and I think you have an interesting image.
Doors
- This is a fascinating door, although I think the image would work better if it was taken from directly in front (a problem I always have) as it’s impossible (at least within my limited abilities) to get all the verticals in the image properly vertical. I’ve straightened it as far as I could.
- I also cropped to remove the distractions on the left side.
- The picture was obviously taken in bright sunlight so looks a little washed out. I adjusted exposure by -1 stop and played around with the tone curve to increase contrast and detail, and also enhance the colour of the door.
Thursday Doors: Bonnefont
Posted on December 31, 2015
As a special end-of-year treat, this week Norm suggests we recycle a previous post. So here’s a door I used last year for a WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge on the theme of Endurance. You can see why.
The hamlet of Bonnefont is just a few miles from here, but with about 30 houses its a sprawling metropolis compared to here at Tranquility Base, which can muster ten permanently occupied and half a dozen holiday homes.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Now
Posted on December 28, 2015
Not quite now, but about half an hour ago: dawn over Tranquility Base, as seen from my bedroom window.
Thursday Doors: Muscat
Posted on December 24, 2015
By way of a change, after a steady diet of decrepit French rustic doors, here is something a little more opulent, from the Grand Mosque in Muscat, Oman.
Muscat
Faraway
Posted on December 20, 2015
Where we live is quite close to the geographical centre of mainland France (l’hexagone), so not surprisingly the skies above us are quite busy with planes flying to or from faraway places – sometimes to quite dramatic effect:
Fortunately, they are at high altitude when they pass over, so we can’t hear them
Weekly Photo Challenge: Gathering
Posted on December 20, 2015
Daughter, son-in-law and grandsons are going to gather with us for Christmas, arriving on Tuesday. We think we’re ready for them…
Before & After: Boat
Posted on December 18, 2015
My little exercise in post-processing this week was actually inspired by the December One Photo Focus, which was published last Friday. My own humble effort can be found here, but I was particularly interested by some of the other participants’ use of the more sophisticated and creative tools available in Photoshop. Apart from anything else, it made me more determined than ever to try to get to grips properly with this extraordinarily sophisticated (downright clever) program.
Original image
This photograph was taken at the famous lily pond in Claude Monet’s garden at Giverny, in Normandy. The day was very overcast and drizzly, so the light was very flat, the water looks very drab and even the reflections are rather dull. The whole thing obviously needs some work.
Lightroom
Some basic editing in Lightroom helped to cheer up the image. Cropping made the boat the centre of attention and some work with the sliders brought out more detail. Increasing the Green Saturation helped to overcome the overall flatness, and moving up the Clarity and Vibrance gave the image more punch. Without being anything special, it’s a lot better than it was.
Photoshop
Then it occurred to me that, since the picture was taken in a painter’s garden, why not make it look more like a painting? And since Monet was, of course, an Impressionist, why not try to give it something of an impressionist feel?
So I used the Paint Daub effect in Photoshop and came up with the image below. I could have made the effect more extreme, but – if I’m honest – chickened out. Anyway, it’s far removed from the original image and, I think, a lot more interesting.
Thursday Doors: Close To Home
Posted on December 17, 2015
Last week’s door wasn’t very far from here, but today I’m even closer to home: about 30 feet from my back door.
Our house is actually two cottages knocked together (if you want to know a little more, you can read this) and forms one end of a larger bâtiment which includes two barns, one of which belongs to us and one to our neighbour, Albert (whose own house is just in front of ours). Needless to say, this being rural France, our barn is at the far end of the bâtiment, and it’s Albert’s that adjoins our house.
You get used to it.
Anyway, this picture is a detail of the very ancient side door to Albert’s barn. You can get some idea of its age from the grooves that have been worn in the wood from the swinging latch. I’m glad I took this when I did, because he’s only gone and painted it, hasn’t he?
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