Weston Redux

[RSL]

.

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

Nice shell (but it's not "street"    )

[Christoph C. Feldhaim]

Just for reference:
The Edward Weston image and the according Wikipedia article :

"Nautilus" (1927) by Edward Weston

I like Russ' interpretation.

It does not have the classic modernistic and symmetric aspect, like the Weston shot,
but what I really appreciate, apart from the nice tones and stuff is the notion
of the "thing" floating in and through the black (outer ?) space, slowly and peacefully,
like a completely different beast in one of the "Star Trek" Episodes.

It could use even more black empty (negative ..) space around it and be put in the lower left corner,
to depict movement into the direction of the opening and the light..
Photoshopping stars in would possibly move it into the realm of kitsch (not sure about that - would be worth a collage experiment),
with just the black emptiness around it its a strong and compelling image.

Great shot, Russ !

Cheers
~Chris


Nits: There is some dirt in the black you might want to clean up ...

[AFairley]

Love the way the shell fades to black so the rear edges are lost.  I focus so much on keeping detail in the shadows I forget how effective it can be to just let them go to black.  Very well done.  (A minor quibble would be the hot spot on the front of the shell, though.)

[RSL]

Yeah, it bothers me too, Alan, but I haven't found a way to clean it up. I've worked on it in ACR, with the burn brush in Photoshop, and with Viveza, and so far I haven't found a way to reduce it convincingly without also removing the brightness from other parts. I was shooting with hard light. Maybe I'll go back and try it again with a softbox on the speedlight, but I'm afraid soft light is going to subdue the striations on the side of the shell. It's an interesting problem.

Thanks, Chris. Yes, I cleaned up a lot of dirt, and it looks okay on my monitor, but I'm sure it's not completely clean. Problem is I don't have a proper piece of black velvet and I was using my black Columbia fleece. Before I try it again I'm going to have to go to a local fabric store and get some velvet.

[Christoph C. Feldhaim]

I allowed myself to work on the hotspot (healing brush) and the dust bunnies ...
Really tried to be careful...
Cheers
~Chris

[cjogo]

Yeah, it bothers me too, Alan, but I haven't found a way to clean it up. I've worked on it in ACR, with the burn brush in Photoshop, and with Viveza, and so far I haven't found a way to reduce it convincingly without also removing the brightness from other parts.

tight > Cloning would work well ...

[RSL]

Thanks cjogo. I spent about fifteen minutes doing exactly that: cloning. I'm going to have to re-shoot this with some black velvet. The black fleece is just too coarse. On the other hand, as I said, I was using hard light, which brings out all the coarseness of the background. If I can get a decent version with soft light the problem may go away.

Thanks Chris. That's better than I was able to do. Did you clone?

[Dale Villeponteaux]

Another way is to use the brush tool to paint it black and fade the brush tool, on another layer is easiest.  Then clean up the image with the brush tool set to shell and again fade if needed. Photoshop has myriads of ways to accomplish any one goal.

Regards,
Dale

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

It's certainly worth a lot of time and effort to get it just right. If the softbox doesn't retain the gorgeous tonalities on the sides of the shell, please go back to the hard light version and work on that hot spot. It just wants to be subdues, not eliminated, IMHO.

[Christoph C. Feldhaim]

...
Thanks Chris. That's better than I was able to do. Did you clone?

I just used the healing brush tool and healed some structure, carefully trying to align it well.

[Jim Pascoe]

Just too high contrast for me Russ.  And I feel the shell needs some separation from the background top left.  Love the idea though and very good quality.

Jim

[Michael West]

Weston may have shot the nautilus long before you did..but yours is far more captivating.