Luminous Landscape Forum

The Art of Photography => User Critiques => Topic started by: Hans Kruse on May 07, 2009, 06:55:30 pm

Title: God Rays II
Post by: Hans Kruse on May 07, 2009, 06:55:30 pm: Abother image taken the same day as the other image with the title "God Rays". Here I chose a different foreground and I also used tone mapping to level out the dynamic range. I'm interested in your opinions.

(http://jjd.pbase.com/hkruse/image/106583076/original.jpg)
Title: God Rays II
Post by: mike.online on May 07, 2009, 07:50:59 pm: stunning photo. not a huge fan of the title (sorry!) but a beautiful photograph.
Title: God Rays II
Post by: John R on May 07, 2009, 08:33:54 pm: I like this one much more than the first. I find the foreground so much more interesting with its gradations of light and shadow that give the low hills a rich texture.

JMR
Title: God Rays II
Post by: AndrewKulin on May 07, 2009, 09:16:36 pm: I second JMR's comment.

Andrew
Title: God Rays II
Post by: Jeremy Roussak on May 08, 2009, 03:58:13 am: Quote from: AndrewKulin
I second JMR's comment.

Andrew
And I third (!) it.

Jeremy
Title: God Rays II
Post by: Eric Myrvaagnes on May 08, 2009, 10:08:22 am: Quote from: kikashi
And I third (!) it.

Jeremy

Fourth!
Title: God Rays II
Post by: Hans Kruse on May 09, 2009, 09:48:57 am: Quote from: EricM
Fourth!

Thank you all for the comments. I personally like both of them and therefore both are included in the gallery of my best landscape photos http://hanskrusephotography.com/gallery/69...448431720_puYvC (http://hanskrusephotography.com/gallery/6999416_4GuXj#448431720_puYvC)
Title: God Rays II
Post by: Jonathan Wienke on May 09, 2009, 10:41:41 pm: I prefer HDR images that look more natural. In this example, the use of HDR tone mapping is very blatant; the adjacent blown-to-white and nearly-black areas of cloud are a dead giveaway as is the completely unnatural-looking black area in the edge of the mountainside just to the right of center. But in spite of this, there are large areas of the clouds that are clipped to textureless white. The usual purpose of HDR technique is to avoid clipping, so that some kind of detail is maintained throughout the image. I would redo the blending so that the black area on the mountain edge goes away, and so that there are no large, featureless, blown-out white cloud areas. Overall, you have a strong image; it just needs a bit of work to be all it can be.

Just my tuppence, YMMV.
Title: God Rays II
Post by: Hans Kruse on May 10, 2009, 04:15:21 pm: Quote from: Jonathan Wienke
I prefer HDR images that look more natural. In this example, the use of HDR tone mapping is very blatant; the adjacent blown-to-white and nearly-black areas of cloud are a dead giveaway as is the completely unnatural-looking black area in the edge of the mountainside just to the right of center. But in spite of this, there are large areas of the clouds that are clipped to textureless white. The usual purpose of HDR technique is to avoid clipping, so that some kind of detail is maintained throughout the image. I would redo the blending so that the black area on the mountain edge goes away, and so that there are no large, featureless, blown-out white cloud areas. Overall, you have a strong image; it just needs a bit of work to be all it can be.

Just my tuppence, YMMV.

Hi Jonathan,

Thanks very much for your thoughts about this image. It's actually not an HDR image. It is just a single image where I used tone mapping (Photomatix plugin for Photoshop CS3). I didn't strive for a naturally looking image and tone mapping does indeed create som unnaturally looking images no matter what. You are right there is clipping in the brightest part and I didn't feel this was unnatural at all. Actually on the contrary. It would look rather strange if there was no clipping at all in the areas where the sunrays go through the clouds.

I made a different development of the image using no tone mapping and entirely in Lightroom with a graduated filter to tame the light from the sky.

Here it is

(http://www.pbase.com/hkruse/image/112370044/original.jpg)
Title: God Rays II
Post by: dalethorn on May 10, 2009, 05:40:20 pm: I like the idea of this, as a lesson in different ways to produce a fnal image from the same starting point.