DSLR Photography Forum

I had to crop a little because of my shadow... but let's see what you think about it.

This is an excellent shot and shows a very good eye. I love the movement and the composition. I think it could use a little sharpening. I would first use a smart blur filter then a sharpening filter or even use the brushstroke/lines around figures filter, darken the lines, then fade the brushstrokes using edit.

(I'm sure I didn't get all the names of these Paintshop thingies right)

something like this:

It is a very good shot Irma - perfect crop - lots of detail. I tried messing with it a little in Photoshop and the things I did to it were so much like what Don did that they were not worth seperately posting.

After having tried it, I found that sharpening this photo much weakened the flowing appearance of the leaves. So - to emphasize the flow of the leaves - I simplified it with Buzz, applied anistrophic diffusion to it and sharpened it just slightly.

What I ended up with is a photo that is just different from yours - not better, not improved, just different.

Lovely work, Irma.

That really does make it flow.

--Don

Hi everyone

uuhmmm, Irma dear?

May I ask what camera do you have? and lenses? Im asking this because most of your pixs are a bit flat? is it a digital? do you shoot on manual or what settings?

ok....first why did u use that shutter speed? did u wanted the sea out of focus or just wanted to freeze the branches? Im asking this because if you could have closer and crop more and give a much longer exposure you could have a much niiicer pix.

I can already see it...the golden brandes with the blue of the sea..gooosh I fell totaly inspired!


Regards

christian

@Don: I will try with the settings you are giving me.. I think they are very valuable since I haven't worked with photoshop yet, and I think I will give it a try... The little problem I have with this program is that it is in German, and I must admit that I don't use my German for any computer matter... but with your directions I might be able to play with it

@Toad: Yes, I can see the difference with your picture and mine, my first thought was to work the leaves like you did, I have even one picture with the leaves a little blured but not the way you did it with motion, they were just blurred that is why I wasn't sure... and here comes the question When you have a picture like this it isn't necessary to have your main object sharp? I mean Is it valid to blur it to give this feeling of motion and not to have anything sharp?

@Christian: My camera is an Olympus C-3000. Lenses? If you mean whether I can change lenses in my camera? No I can't. and the numbers it has is af zoom 6.5-19.5mm 1:2.8. Probably my pictures look flat because I use the auto in most of the setting, well, I change the B&W settings and I use the macro mode when needed, but that is about all... What I wanted to have is the sea blurred and the leaves sharp... I have to say that I had to fight with a terrible wind to get this I think I still need to read a lot and try a lot to be able to shot manual...

Thanks a lot for your comments...

Irma Wrote:Probably my pictures look flat because I use the auto in most of the setting,

You might try something simple like increasing the camera's contrast and saturation settings.

You can even increase the in-camera sharpening, though you'd have greater control and quality if you saved that for the last step in post-processing.

Finally, after you shrink your images for the web, you could give them just a little kiss of sharpening; in photoshop something like 90 amt, 0.3-0.5 radius, 1-2 threshold seems to do a nice job on web-sized images.

But, in the image you posted here, I think the soft effect works best. Just my preference.

Irma Wrote:and here comes the question When you have a picture like this it isn't necessary to have your main object sharp? I mean Is it valid to blur it to give this feeling of motion and not to have anything sharp?

Absolutely - that is a great example of the difference between photo-journalism and photography as art. Look at some of the work of Henri Cartier-Bresson and other classic art photographers. His photo of dancers at a ball for example - all the dresses swirling and the couples spinning - wonderful - and not a sharp line in the photo.

I sense that you are headed down the path of art photography - feel free to experiment - be aware of the "rules" but don't be afraid to break them.

@slejhamer: Thanks for your post, I'll try to find some tutorials and read thoroughly the manual of my camera so then I will be able to make to changes in my setting you suggested.

@Toad: Thanks for your comment Toad, I will search and find art photographers bio and work and see what they have done and how they have done it.