Morning Fields

I was attracted to the many layers of foliage here in the Owen's Valley. I'd been shooting with photographer Floris Van Brugel at the time, and he'd mentioned wanting to find some areas with foliage to shoot so I showed him this location I knew of. We returned a couple times to try to get it right. I captured this image the first day, and he took a similar one the second day. I also came back a week later and worked on a 75mp mosaic of the scene (which is pointless for web posting).

 

I've found this to be one of the harder images I've had to process in recent memory, as I'm struggling to keep the focus on the main elements and with too much sharpness and brightness things start looking just a bit too chaotic IMO. Also, the colors have been a challenge as this image has such vibrant variation and range. Any critique would be welcome.

Thanks for commenting.

Fantastic layers in this image, great work.

Oh yea.. :) you know, I didn't actually realize how the composition I ended up with that second day was this close to yours. I do like the slight extra space you have on the top and bottom.. I've found composing in live view I tend to end up with tighter compositions, maybe I'm just used to the 95% view finder, I'll have to keep that in mind. I found this one really tough to process as well.

 

Anyways, I love how you brought out the trees, though I find the foreground a bit too dark for my tastes. Also the oranges in the back are a bit too saturated I think. Your painterly like style certainly comes through in this one. I can't wait till next winter to explore this area again!

 

 

I agree that foreground is slightly darker, but I think it is also accentuating the existing vibrancy in the colors. I like compositions you both have taken.

 

This one is definitely made to hang on a wall with some dark tones and nice medium illumination incandescent light, which will also bring that painterly light in the background. Very different for Adamus style landscapes, but similar to one the one you had shoot year before, but more interesting lighting conditions.

 

Regards

+Lalit

 

Lovely shot. Congratulations!

excellent stuff marc.

Beautifil colors and levels in this shot. It looks really like a painting.

 

Ciao

Raffaella

Yes, this is a very difficult image to render, because of the large numer of different layers and the large amount of details.

Your effort to separate and emphasize every layer is good, but to my eyes the foreground suffers from a visible heavier editing than the background: it seems the effect you get when changing the layer blend mode to "difference" in PS.

A real difficult scene, but a fine artistic vision and work!

Regards, Alberto.

I like the layers of colors and textures. Nicely done. Dan

I think you've done an amazing job on this from conception, to presentation. No nits here... except that the fg seems a tad on the dark side ;)

Nothing describes this better than what's been said above A COLOR SYMPHONY!!!! Regards!

very unusual, but great picture, because of the colours and composition. Was the green in the foreground real, or did you play with it?

The green (teal/turquoise) color of the sage is absolutely real. You'll notice its true color in Floris' version of this image as well.

Wonderful image and different for you. Not the usual grand scale but rather a delicate balance of both propinquity and softness and the distant majesty of the sun. As usual a beautiful work. Best wishes rek.

some new and very different. magical colors and textures. outstanding photo.

The only part that looks a tad unnatural to me is the bluish/green color in the grass near the bottom. One of the most original landscapes I have seen in recent memory. GJ

Exquisite tonality and pallette here, Marc, not to mention composition and the flow of energy... I'm sure that camera RAW pulled this one out for you, but this is one of those images I'd love to see as a 4x5 chrome too. Congrats on your fine sense of vision. Alan