"Fannette Greets the Day"

I've posted several images from this general location and from this same morning taken almost a year ago. This composition has been lying in wait, however. I have sidestepped the image because I knew blending these frames successfully would be a chore. Last week I upgraded to CS5 and one of the features I have been looking forward to using is the new Merge to HDR Pro. I hear it is much improved from previous versions. I have never used an HDR plugin, always using luminosity masks and other hand blending techniques. Well, I am not so impressed, at least not yet. The sky was neon-like and the specular highlights in the foreground rock were glowing like hot embers. The good news is it gave me a suitable canvas to work from. So I dropped out the sky and reflection with a layer mask and dropped in a new one from another exposure. Then I used another exposure to blend in the foreground rocks. You see, as long as the image has not been cropped, it will still match the ratio of the original frames, so I can farm pixels from any one of those exposures. Good news is that the Merge to HDR Pro gave me a good starting point and worked out some of the difficulties of blending around the trees, sky, reflection and far shorelines. The overall luminosity of the resulting image matches my eye's recollection of the scene. I had to do some cleanup of a few flares and the HDR has given the middle distant tress an odd like mesh pattern when viewed at 100%, which I will resolve soon. As we grow in our understanding of post processing, we will inevitably revisit older works to give them new life. I feel this one was worth the time. Please look at the Larger preview and offer your observations!

Fannette is the small island in the middle of Emerald Bay at Lake Tahoe. Thanks for

having a look!

I always liked this shot of yours from E.Bay.  I like everything about it, but the bluish cast on the FG center and left rocks and the dead pine snag.  That's an easy tweak though.  A very picturesque comp and exposure.  I'd sure like to be up at Tahoe right now and enjoying some cooler temps!  Cheers!  Chris

Thanks Aungshita and Chris! Chris, the darkroom technician in me agrees with you, the cyan-blue cast should be mitigated to be color correct. Yes, an easy fix. The purist in me, however, likes the mix of cool and warm and contends that it is a part of the scene. I believe that at this time of day, there is indeed a mix of cool and warm tones just by the nature of the ambient light, some direct and some indirect. Neutral rocks agree with our perception that rocks are neutral in nature. Snow is white and water is blue. No, wait, snow is blue and water is clear. I guess what I am saying is that a rock is a reflective surface, just like water. The water in this scene is just a reflection of the sky and the rocks are also reflecting the varying color temps. Regardless, I will take a look at warming or nullifying the effect to see how it compares. Thanks for your keen observation!

Great capture of great scene at right moment! Bravo.

Hamid.

A fairy-tale atmosphere. Beautiful picture.

I like your pale and transparent colors and the refleksion of light in the rocks.

Well done.

Tommy

I see we have been standing in each other's footprints.  I have several from that exact vantage.  I have to say that your old method of processing far exceeds this one.  As do most "HDR by Button" images, there is a bit of the cartoon look to this, and it's a splendid image otherwise.  S 

I wish I could stand in your footsteps -- this is a wonderful scene.  To my eyes, I think the overall scene is a bit overexposed relative to the sun (the sun rays are very nice).  If I were sitting on your computer chair, I'd experiment with lowering the exposure overall.  The blue in the sky just isn't right.  I wish I were sufficiently smart or articulate to explain why or, better, what to do instead, but the blue just doesn't match the scene based on my experiences with nature.  It's a great scene and certainly worthy of time and effort on your part.

Mark -  This is a tremendously challenging scene to capture with the lighting you were given, and honestly, I probably would not have tried to capture it due to obvious difficulties of backlighting.  You have done a great job with the lighting.  The cloud bank looks like it may have provided a bit of natural grad filtering.  I guess I would expect the shadows to be a bit darker, especially the center rock.  The right tree shadow looks great-the left evergreen looks like it it has been lit from the opposite direction.  The sky color does look a touch cyan-  I can't really coment on the backlit evergreens - not sure I have seen them backlit so strongly  I do like the overall mood of the image and I think it really captures the feeling you must have had while there.  A couple of branches near the top intrude a bit, but easily corrected.  The centered sun doesn't really bother me, as it's high in the top third or so.  I think you did a remarkable job with one of the more difficult images yoou could have tested the software with. It would be interesting to see how Photomatrix or some of the other third party software compares.  It's amazing how learning new processing techniques can really make an older image sing, even with subtle adjustments.

Keep up the good work, Harry

Thanks Hamid, Gunnar, Tommy, Steve, Steve and Harry! The backlighting in this situation is probably one of the more challenging images one could encounter given the busy nature of the composition. I truly enjoy the complexities of such scenes and I am usually somewhat indifferent to the minimalist compositions, they just don't hold my interest as long. Making this scene work is close to banging your head against the wall. Still, I was there and I wanted to submit my best effort, successfully or falling short. Based upon the responses, I would say I have arrived somewhere in the middle. At least everyone can see the bruises on my head. Stephen, I respect your assessments. It would be helpful to have something more tangible than "the sky just doesn't look right". It is vague, but I know you are probably not sure yourself what is not right about it. As far as the luminosity, I truly know what you are saying. Based upon our experience with scenes like this captured on film or digitally, we would expect to see the foreground elements much darker. The variance of light in this scene is great from fore to back, and the camera would record it accordingly. The scene captured with one exposure would not be possible because the camera has only one setting for the aperture. My attempt with scenes like this is to produce something close to how our own eyes perceive such a scene. While we scan a scene, our pupils are responding in real time, opening and closing based upon the light value. The camera has a fixed pupil and cannot record the scene in a similar manner. My take on this, based upon some responses, is to find a balance. Harry, I appreciate your feedback as well. When I view the image on other monitors, there are some variations of sky color, with cyan present. All of the advice I receive from all responses is very much appreciated. I am happy with the overall appearance of the image, but I truly value my peers perceptions and realize the importance of photography as a form of communication. As Ansel Adams said, "the image either speaks to the viewer or it doesn't".