(Nikon D90 + 18-200mm Click to view larger)
This was taken a couple of years back and I've always liked the naturalness of the scene - and the fact that for once the women have the cameras and the boys are the butterflies!
But I've never done anything with the shot to try and make it particularly 'pop'. So for no reason in particular and because I had some time on my hands, I thought I'd see if it could be improved. And as this is a photo blog, I'll briefly share with you what was done.
The trouble with the original was mainly down to the dominant greenery surrounding the group itself. It swamped the picture. So into Photoshop and take that green channel down for a start and then punch up the contrast using a touch of curves. A little better, but that background was still overpowering. So the next job was to darken that off especially behind the boys so they stood out more. Now the group was starting to take more centre stage as they should. Not really much left to do but enhance the ladies dress colours slightly (but not the background) and darken specific areas with a bit of 'burning' here and there to give the image even more three-dimensional depth. Finish off with a touch of sharpening, and for that I used just a touch of high-pass filter appropriate for a small web-sized image, and that's it, done. Notice how the daisies on the lawn show up more now?
The trouble with the original was mainly down to the dominant greenery surrounding the group itself. It swamped the picture. So into Photoshop and take that green channel down for a start and then punch up the contrast using a touch of curves. A little better, but that background was still overpowering. So the next job was to darken that off especially behind the boys so they stood out more. Now the group was starting to take more centre stage as they should. Not really much left to do but enhance the ladies dress colours slightly (but not the background) and darken specific areas with a bit of 'burning' here and there to give the image even more three-dimensional depth. Finish off with a touch of sharpening, and for that I used just a touch of high-pass filter appropriate for a small web-sized image, and that's it, done. Notice how the daisies on the lawn show up more now?
Nice shot. I see the difference. The darken background and the colourful dresses do emphasize the separation between two different worlds of sensitivity.
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by, L.A.!
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