Creative Effects Challenge No. 139 - RAW Oregon Sunset

[hmca]

Edited just using Camera RAW in LR. Also "played" with the color grading feature. And "play" is the operative word here as I really had no idea what I was doing.
Screenshots taken from LR.....does anyone know a way to make them smaller?






Tried to bring out some detail in the haystack like Tony did.

[Lillias]

Nice toning in this edit Helen. Whatever you did it works for me...

[Lillias]

Took image into camera raw – PSE -


Back in PSE took into the Nik Collection - Color Efex Pro 4 and from the Sunlight set of presets I chose the 02 Bright Contrast Preset.

Back in PSE again I used a layer mask and with a soft brush at a lower opacity I brushed away some of the Bright Contrast in certain areas and then blended that layer with the original layer.
I straightened the image and then I placed a Grainy Vignette Photo Overlay from Design Bundles on the image, inverted it and I was done.

[hmca]

What an elegant edit, Lillias. It's always interesting to read about how you use layer masks.

[pontiac1940]

First off, I never took a shot of the ACR adjustments. Sorry.
Generally: 

• Did a hard crop as I see Karen has done. To my eye there is a lot of superfluous areas within the original, so I removed the left side and a lot of the bottom because they do not contribute to the rocks and actual sunset which are the focus of this photo.   
• The original horizon line was too centered so the crop took care of that. The rocks were also too centered. 
• Ooops. It might be camera direction, but it appears now that the horizon might be a tad off level. Just saw that now.  
• The level adjustments were sort of: lightened shadows and blacks to bring minor deets to the interesting rocks. Also increased contrast a tad. 
• Reduce highlights and white levels. 
• I increased clarity a small amount ... hitting that slider hard resulted in the dreaded border halos on the rocks. 
• Increased vibrance to fire up the colors (as does increasing contrast). 

The jazzed up colors might be too much. (I do not jazz up my own sunset shots this much.) 

You could add a cutesy saying in the upper right quadrant. 

Herewith my effort! 

Clive

[hmca]

Thanks for giving the reasons for all of your edits, Clive. I especially like the crop.

Jan 3, 2021 3:22:44 GMT pontiac1940 said:

The jazzed up colors might be too much. (I do not jazz up my own sunset shots this much.) 

When an image is submitted to the RAW challenge, members have the opportunity to apply their own creative vision, or perhaps experiment with a new style, so I'm happy to see that you
tried with a look that might not be something you would normally do.

[tonyw]

One more playing around with the white balance in LR as well as other basic adjustments and then took it into ON1 RAW and found a LUT that I liked - aiming for a sunset effect.

[hmca]

So happy to see a new offering before this challenge ends on Thursday. You have come up with a totally different look that suits the scene well.

[Lillias]

Last try from me...
This could be a late night sunset or a very early morning sunrise!

[hmca]

I can see what you mean, Lillias. Certainly has the look of either.......unless you were looking to be geographically specific.

[Lillias]

Jan 6, 2021 17:34:14 GMT hmca said:

unless you were looking to be geographically specific.

Who me?

[hmca]

Thank you to everyone who submitted an edit for this image. This was actually one of my images that I discovered recently when going through old folders.
It wasn't easy selecting my three favorites as there are parts of each one of them that I especially liked. Narrowing it down to just three I decided on
the following edits presented in the order they were submitted.

1. Tony's B/W version was beautifully toned. I especially liked the hint of highlights crossing the tops of the waves in the foreground which was something I had hoped to bring out. I also liked how he selectively brought out some detail in the stacks.




2. Karen presented a moody image with slight adjustments in ACR. I liked the subtlety of her approach. As noted by Clive, her crop focuses on the stacks and avoids them being centered in the image.




3. My third choice was the refreshing look of Lillias' edit. A very different approach that I just found appealing and something that never would have occurred to me.



Our next RAW Challenge will be posted on March 6th. All members are invited and encouraged to submit an image for this challenge. Just send me a PM and let me know that you are interested and we will work out the details.

[Lillias]

Great challenge Helen, I enjoyed it. Congratulations to Tony and Karen and thanks from me too.

[tonyw]

Thanks Helen, it was a very good choice of a raw image to work on. Many ways to interpret it as evidenced by all who played with it.

Tony

[tourerjim]

Been very busy with my my other hobbies but popped in with this one.