theonlyD800inthehameau
Photography by theonlydeadheadinthehameau
52 Weeks Photo Challenge: Week 4 – Reflections
Posted on August 29, 2016
Very happy to see that reflections is the new topic for the 52 Weeks Photo Challenge. That’s much more like it – one of my favourite subjects, in fact.
This is an image of the River Vienne as it runs through Confolens. The water is calm at this point, just upstream from the weir
Weekly Photo Challenge: Curve
Posted on June 18, 2016
The dramatic curve of the entrance to the Manarat Al Saadiyat exhibition centre on Saadiyat Island in Abu Dhabi seems like a suitable entry for this week’s Photo Challenge.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Pure
Posted on June 11, 2016
Earlier this week, a moment of pure tranquility on the banks of the Charente river at Chaniers:
One Photo Focus June 2016
Posted on June 3, 2016
The original image for this month’s One Photo Focus was taken by David Croker and is a lovely shot of peaceful serenity; who doesn’t like the combination of sky, water and reflections?
The only problem with this original is that the air of tranquility is jarred somewhat by the electricity pylons running right across the horizon. I realise that it’s possible to remove such intrusions through various photo editing programs,including Photoshop, which I have myself, but it looks like a very painstaking exercise, particularly if (a) you haven’t done it before and (b) when there are not only wires but also the pylons to be erased.
Then I recalled that for a WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge some time ago, with the theme of ‘Dreamy‘, I had used a reflected image to get the dreamlike look that the assignment called for, and I thought it had worked quite well.
Accordingly, I adopted the same principle for this One Photo Focus, to produce this:
Here’s what I did:
- Flipped the image horizontally
- Cropped to remove the sky – and therefore the power pylons and cables. I also wanted to highlight that cloud on the right of the original image, so cropped out the whole of the left half
- After that, it was simply a matter of adding a little ‘punch’ in Lightroom, and also adjusting colour Luminance to make the green and blue of the reflected boats stand out more.
I’m quite pleased with the dreamy, painting-y effect of this revised version
Composition: The Outtakes
Posted on April 19, 2016
We’re having what the French call a pause pour reflexion in Cee’s Compose Yourself Photo Challenge this time around. A time to think about the ground we’ve covered already and also an opportunity to show some images that didn’t quite make the cut for posting under the various topics that we’ve dealt with in the past months. Here’s a selection of mine:
Perspective
Now, what is this a picture of? Is it the building on the right (the apartment block in Abu Dhabi where we lived for ten years)? Or is it the glass-plated building on the left? Or perhaps it’s the reflection of the former in the latter?
Diagonal Lines
I used an image of two giraffes in my first posting on the topic of diagonal lines, but I could equally have used this profile of a horse – one of many in the fields around here.
Now two images that cover more than one aspect of the various topics we’ve looked at so far:
Leading Lines & Analogous Colours
A hillside vineyard near the village of Ay, in the Champagne region shows blue and green together, as well as leading lines
Geometry and Contrasting Colours
Orange and blue dominate this image of a seal at Taronga Zoo in Sydney. Obviously the balanced ball is one geometric shape but the curve of the seal’s body is like an arc of a circle.
Hugh’s Photo Challenge: Week 16 – Behind
Posted on March 9, 2016
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.
Symmetry
Posted on January 13, 2016
Something in the human brain is attracted to symmetry; we find it – almost always – aesthetically pleasing. And, as Cee points out this week, it can appear in many different guises.
To begin with, here are two images from the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi. The first is yet another (no apologies though) chandelier, pictured from below, which is an example of circular symmetry, while the second is the top of a dome, which is obviously an example of left/right symmetry.
Although symmetry is an important element of Islamic art, it also features extensively in secular situations in Arab countries. Here is part of the seawall on the Abu Dhabi Corniche and – more prosaically – the underground carpark of the Dubai Mall.
It’s also possible to see symmetry in multiple subjects: like these two conjoined kites from the Blond airshow and a set of measuring jugs from a museum in Sarlat.
And finally, the symmetry of reflections on the Dordogne River
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.
Rule of Thirds (2)
Posted on December 10, 2015
To be honest, finding ‘ready-made’ images that occupy two-thirds of the picture was a bit of a challenge. That probably just goes to show that I am (or was) too wedded to sticking the subject in the middle of the photograph as a matter of course. Still, a bit of creative cropping did the job.
This week, I have three pairs of similar images illustrating the 2/3rds theme (hover over the image and caption for a fuller description).
To begin with, a couple of archways:
And here are two water-based scenes:
And finally (appropriately) two sunsets:
Cee’s Compose Yourself Challenge: Using 2/3rds of your photo frame
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