Change (Watercolour)

I have blurred the colour quite a bit, but left the luminance sharp.  Have a look at the detail if you're interested.

Jamie, what I like about your work is that you are a photographer's photographer, shooting not for the "masses" but for those who can be expected to appreciate what you are trying to do.  I am hardly among the cognoscenti when it comes to photography, but I think that this is absolute genius.  It sure beats the heck out of the one-step Shake-n-Bake watercolor filter that one can get as a free download.  I don't know how you did it, but I like it very much.

--Lannie

Kristina and I routinely blur the LAB colour planes to reduce colour grain in film images.  There is still luminance grain, but that almost never bothers us, even with 800-speed Fuji professional print film.  (I took this on 200-speed Fuji transparency film, not professional.)  The film scans are about 5700 pixels across the long dimension.  To reduce colour grain, we gaussian blur the red-green (a) plane with a radius of two pixels; the yellow-blue (b) plane with a radius of three pixels - enough to extinguish colour grain without reducing saturation appreciably.

That process started me thinking about edges - what's important and what isn't.  For The Watercolour Manipulation, I gaussian blur both colour planes with a radius of thirty pixels (for the same 5700-pixel-wide images).  The radius is then ten to fifteen times the grain-reduction parameters, and 1/190 the width of the picture.  That value worked well.  It's easy to over-do, I found.

That much colour blur significantly reduces saturation, so I start with a strongly saturated image, blur the colour planes, and then increase saturation again in LAB space using curves.  The result is more saturated than the picture would have been with neutral processing, as you can see by comparing the other two you commented on with their corresponding images in the "Electric Picture" account.  Thanks so much Lannie.  I'm very pleased that you like them.  best, jamie

I blurred the colour but left the luminance intact to give it a subtle

watercolour look.

Nice watercolor manipulation. The blue in the background trees suggests a color balance (+15Yellow) adjustment but if this is wish to portray as an artist and photographer, then it is fine.

necessary overexposure to get the silhouetted leaves mitigated by ample blur in the trees leaves blue there but nowhere else.  i like it though.  thanks Tony.  best, j

So glad I found this Jamie !! thank you - I will cut and paste your instructions - this turned out lovely - I would rather do it myself like you.  Such a beautiful result.