Before & After: Butterfly
Posted on February 12, 2016
Butterflies can make for great images, but they’re not the most co-operative of subjects: have you ever tried to get one to sign a model release form?
Last summer I spent a merry, if sometimes frustrating, couple of hours on a sunny afternoon trying to get some worthwhile photographs of the butterflies that were feasting on one of our buddleias. Obviously, I was using my longest lens, but as that\s only 200mm I couldn’t get as close as I might have wished.
Before
As it stands, this isn’t much of a photograph but there was the germ of something more interesting in there, although it needed a fair bit of post-processing to tease it out.
After
The first step was to crop out most of the background. Once I’d focused in on the butterfly it seemed clear that rotating the image would make it more arresting and give a more pleasing composition. I also flipped it so that the butterfly was facing upwards.
After that, it was a matter of adjusting various sliders to give more ‘punch’ not only to the overall image but also the individual colours, where I altered Luminance rather than Hue. A final touch of Sharpening and there you have it.
Ponies in the snow
Posted on February 11, 2016
These Shetland ponies used to be found in a field about a quarter of a mile from our place. The snow (it was a couple of years ago) lends itself well to the monochrome version.
Hugh’s Weekly Photo Challenge: Week 12 – Games
Posted on February 11, 2016
This week’s theme is ‘Games’, so here is a photograph taken last summer of my twin grandsons playing basketball in our swimming pool.
Thursday Doors: Venice (again)
Posted on February 11, 2016
Back to Venice again for this week’s contribution – although this time an ancient door, much in need of some TLC, on one of the small waterways that lie behind the Grand Canal (and are at least as interesting).
Hugh’s Weekly Photo Challenge: Week 11 – Rust
Posted on February 7, 2016
My first time participating in Hugh’s Weekly Photo Challenge and it’s on the subject of rust.
Oradour-sur-Glane was the scene of a massacre of over 600 French civilians in June 1944, and ever since the village has been left as it was, as a memorial and open-air museum. Inevitably, there’s a lot of rust about, including this car and petrol pump.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Time
Posted on February 6, 2016
Not the most ‘out-of-the-box’ take on this week’s theme of Time for sure, but an interesting and unusual object nonetheless: the great 24-hour clock, dating from the 1520s – and looking for all the world like a sundial – on the North tower of Chartres Cathedral:
One Photo Focus: February 2016
Posted on February 5, 2016
The original image for this month’s One Photo Focus challenge was provided by Stacy at lensaddiction and is what I’d call a bit of a tester.
Before
After
There’s a lot going on in the original image and not all of it sits comfortably together (a sailing ship and modern high-rise buildings, for a start).
After a lot of thought, I decided to crop in on the rigging and, in particular, the two human figures, which I placed on a Rule-of-Thirds point.
Having looked at the blown-up image, I felt that there wasn’t enough detail in the figures to command much attention so I went for the opposite extreme and effectively turned them into silhouettes by taking down all the sliders – Highlights, Shadows, Whites and Blacks – to -100.
This also made the background sky more interesting and to compound that effect I used a Graduated Filter at the top to reduce the exposure of this part of the image. This not only darkened the clouds but also reduced the ‘blown-out’ area where the sun sits. I think the final result is quite dramatic.
Feeding Time
Posted on February 4, 2016
Never having been one for sharing pictures of my dinner with the world (what exactly is Instagram anyway?), Cee’s chosen subject for this week of ‘Food’ had me stumped initially, notwithstanding that over on my other blog I had recently posted a picture of my take on a deconstructed curry.
But then it occurred to me that it didn’t have to be food for humans, so here’s a close-up of a giraffe grazing on whatever it is that giraffes eat.
Thursday Doors: Abu Dhabi
Posted on February 4, 2016
This is part of the dramatic entrance to the Manarat Al Saadiyat Exhibition Centre in Abu Dhabi.
Cropping
Posted on February 1, 2016
There aren’t many photographs I take that don’t go unedited – especially those that make their way onto this blog – and almost all of those begin with cropping (and straightening where necessary, of course). I agree with Cee very strongly on the importance of cropping: as she writes, it can make a mediocre photo good and a good one great.
(NB: The images in this post have only been cropped, with no other post-processing. In this way, it’s possible to isolate the impact of cropping alone from the overall editing process.)
Eliminating Distractions
This first image was taken from the observation lift that provides panoramic views over Sarlat. The roofs are interesting and colourful but (a) you don’t need to see all of them to get the picture, so to speak and (b) although it’s a medieval town that doesn’t mean that they don’t have access to modern technology. Like satellite dishes; lots of satellite dishes. The cropped version removes all but one (partially obscured) dish – which could be eliminated altogether with further editing, as well as cars, streetlights etc.
As another example of removing distractions, here’s a picture of a nice foxglove, which doesn’t really need the roofline behind it.
Cropping for Composition
Cropping can also be helpful in improving the composition of an image, as in this photograph of the distinctive seedpods of the ‘monnaie du pape’ (‘Honesty’) plant, which in the cropped version are placed on a ‘Rule-of-thirds’ intersection.
Finding a new image
Sometimes, close cropping can reveal a ‘new’ image nested inside the original that isn’t immediately obvious – as in this view from Oradour-sur-Glane.
Taking more than one picture
And finally, as per Cee’s advice always to take more than one photograph, here are two shots of a set of decanters and glasses from a museum in Sarlat. The second is not a crop of the first, but just a close-up: same subject, completely different image.
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