Daegu, South Korea

Crokey

Decided I should give you all a look at what The Land of Morning Calm looks like! Took this on Tuesday after hiking up slightly over 800meters(about 2600feet). Korea is extremely mountainous, over 70%, so they have made as much use of any flat land that they can! I've got a few more that I'm sorting out so I'll put them up when I can. None of my Korean friends believe this is Daegu, which wouldn't be the most beautiful cities in the world:D C&C is welcome, it's why I'm here!


By the way, what's the larges size that these forums support? I'm trying this at smugmug's setting of X2 Large, hope it doesn't upset anyone, and if it does, I apologize in advance and I'll certainly shrink it down if it does.

babowc

That's an amazing capture Colin!
I love the contrast between the cooler city colors in the background against the warmer mountains!

NeilL

It's a great idea Colin. I think I would like a bit more assertiveness/presence in the local contrast/structure/clarity, and more (perhaps selective) saturation/vibrance, or even a tint. I think it begs for the personality which you have given it with the pov to blossom in a distinctive pp treatment.

Neil

RevLinePhoto

That looks like Gunsan am I correct?

Crokey

babowc • Jan-26-2012 03:51 AM
That's an amazing capture Colin!
I love the contrast between the cooler city colors in the background against the warmer mountains!

Thank's babowc, I scooted out as far as I could onto a tiny ledge to try and get those rocks in, they really glowed nicely in the warm light...was -11celcius though! When will it ever snow here?!!!

RevLinePhoto • Jan-26-2012 11:07 AM
That looks like Gunsan am I correct?

This is a mountain called Cheongreongsan(청령산) that is on the very western edge of Daegu, it would behind Apsan if you know that one. Were you stationed in Gunsan for a while?

Crokey

NeilL wrote: »

It's a great idea Colin. I think I would like a bit more assertiveness/presence in the local contrast/structure/clarity, and more (perhaps selective) saturation/vibrance, or even a tint. I think it begs for the personality which you have given it with the pov to blossom in a distinctive pp treatment.

Neil

Thanks Neil, I appreciate your taking the time to view and comment. I had spent about 3/4 hours honing this in photoshop and after that amount of time I think I go color blind! I tweaked it a bit more(very slightly), adding a touch more saturation and clarity,and a fraction more contrast to the trees, but I'm reluctant to over do it. I tend to prefer more pastel and subtle tones, but more than likely your right, it will just take a while for me to see this photo objectively again and then I may attack it again:D

NeilL

Fair enough Colin. It really is a nice shot and I can understand your wanting to nurse its subtlety.

It's difficult to remember what the original version was like, so maybe you could post any re-edited versions in a separate post in the thread for comparison.

Re limitations on image size here, anything that SmugMug allows (in RGB jpg) is ok. You choose the size which you think does justice to your image. No one will complain (unless maybe it's too small!). We love to put our noses right on the screen!

Neil

Crokey

NeilL wrote: »

Fair enough Colin. It really is a nice shot and I can understand your wanting to nurse its subtlety.

It's difficult to remember what the original version was like, so maybe you could post any re-edited versions in a separate post in the thread for comparison.

Re limitations on image size here, anything that SmugMug allows (in RGB jpg) is ok. You choose the size which you think does justice to your image. No one will complain (unless maybe it's too small!). We love to put our noses right on the screen!

Neil

That's a good point about reposting edits separately and I will do so in the future, it would just be a pain to undo edits and remove layers to get back to where I was in the beginning with this photo!

kdog

Nice pano, Colin. The city looks amazing. I'd like to see another view with more of the city, maybe with a longer lens? Processing looks good on this shot to my eye. As for size, you're fine. You could even post it larger. We have a "stretchy" feature here on Dgrin which automatically downsizes images to fit the user's browser. The user can use the "Full size" link which appears under large pictures to enlarge the picture so that they can pan around on it with scrollbars. Otherwise, you can simply expand your browser to see the picture larger. Anyway, keep posting. I'm dying to see more of Korea.

Cheers,
-joel

FlyNavy

Wow!! great capture.

Crokey

kdog wrote: »

Nice pano, Colin. The city looks amazing. I'd like to see another view with more of the city, maybe with a longer lens? Processing looks good on this shot to my eye. As for size, you're fine. You could even post it larger. We have a "stretchy" feature here on Dgrin which automatically downsizes images to fit the user's browser. The user can use the "Full size" link which appears under large pictures to enlarge the picture so that they can pan around on it with scrollbars. Otherwise, you can simply expand your browser to see the picture larger. Anyway, keep posting. I'm dying to see more of Korea.

Cheers,
-joel

Thanks Joel, I just processed a photo last night that I shot with my 80-200f2.8 but I'm letting it simmer before I rush it out! It might actually have less city in it(and my girlfriend, who is Korean, hates it because it has it has any city at all)! I'm hoping to do a hike up some mountains on the east side of the city which should give a much better view of the city, just have to wait till all the haze and fog dies off again

Crokey

FlyNavy wrote: »

Wow!! great capture.

Cheers, I've been getting a new lease on photography in Korea since getting fit enough to do these long hikes. You can bet that I'll be up a mountain again this weekend!

Crokey

Three more from the same hike:

Crokey

This will be the last one, I promise!

NeilL

I like this last one a lot, it has a mediaeval and futuristic look to it both at once - perhaps it's the apocalyptic feel. Very interesting mix of things - colours, areas, river, city, hills... I think the rocks and trees in the bottom right could be stronger to challenge the dominance of so much distant space.

Neil

Crokey

NeilL wrote: »

I like this last one a lot, it has a mediaeval and futuristic look to it both at once - perhaps it's the apocalyptic feel. Very interesting mix of things - colours, areas, river, city, hills... I think the rocks and trees in the bottom right could be stronger to challenge the dominance of so much distant space.

Neil

Cheers Neil,
I used to think that Korea had the ugliest urban landscapes in the world(Europeans are a bit spoiled in this regard) until I saw pictures of urban sprawl in L.A.! Koreans have a very unusual relationship with nature, they do there best to protect these mountains, which had become almost entirely deforested by the 1970s, but refuse to be sympathetic to them. Except for my long suffering girlfriend, who invariably proclaims all my photos "crap"(That's love for you!), I haven't shown these views to any of my Korean friends. It will be interesting to find out what they see in them. I'm fairly certain that the opinions will differ greatly according to the generations.
RE: The rocks and trees: As it was actually very windy, the leaves are quite blurred on the trees so pumping them up will make an ugly blur. I agree with their needing to be stronger, but I think I can do this more easily by softening the background city some. Thanks for the tip.

Crokey

O.K. Seriously the last one this time....
This is the last one from the same day! I went up again today but decided I have enough panos of the city for quite a while:D