High noon along the Discovery Trail

bristlecone

wfeller

Very nice Leonard. Not sure what type of clouds those are (cirrus?), but they make the shot. I've noticed the phenomena around here when they rise fast after coming over the mountains.

bristlecone

Thanks wf......

The clouds do make this image, but I must confess..... I added them. We spent 5 days in the White Mtns. two weeks or so ago, and every day was cloudless. A bummer for me! Camping in Grandview campground at 8500 ft., often jets were creating con trails that would spread out in the upper atmosphere and morf into these fantastic cirris clouds. Eventually changing into rather natural looking cirris. Amazing. I've never seen it occur like this. And it was happening rapidly. The clouds are a single image, taken the day after the image of the bristlecone. Each were taken at noon, with the camera pointing somewhat upward, so they seem to be compatible. The tree, at 10,000 ft., consists of 3 images processed in Photomatix. Most of the HDR stuff I process is done so with minimal use of strength, etc. I don't usually add clouds, but seemed a good match, and without them, the tree against the empty blue is boring. T3i, 17-40 f4L, tripod.

jaharris1001

very nice !! love the tree and I was gonna add what a cool sky,, I appreciate the honesty about adding the clouds too,, you certainly could have left that point out and nobody would have known you know,, Ive tried on numerous occasions Photomatix and just can never get the image I want,, have you gotten the latest version 4.2.4 ? there IS some nice additions in the update, after youve processed the image, you can now tweak contrast and adjust each individual color saturation, I do like that about the update, but still I can never get the natural look that Im after, I did several bracketed images on my "Cypress trees" as is was rather dark in that image, but I just couldnt get a good end result, therefore I used a single image and did a conversion in Silver efex Pro 2.0

wfeller

bristlecone wrote: »

Thanks wf......

The clouds do make this image, but I must confess..... I added them. We spent 5 days in the White Mtns. two weeks or so ago, and every day was cloudless. A bummer for me! Camping in Grandview campground at 8500 ft., often jets were creating con trails that would spread out in the upper atmosphere and morf into these fantastic cirris clouds. Eventually changing into rather natural looking cirris. Amazing. I've never seen it occur like this. And it was happening rapidly. The clouds are a single image, taken the day after the image of the bristlecone. Each were taken at noon, with the camera pointing somewhat upward, so they seem to be compatible. The tree, at 10,000 ft., consists of 3 images processed in Photomatix. Most of the HDR stuff I process is done so with minimal use of strength, etc. I don't usually add clouds, but seemed a good match, and without them, the tree against the empty blue is boring. T3i, 17-40 f4L, tripod.

Good job on the add. Seeing that the clouds were in about the same place and angle at different times keeps it natural-looking. Any tips on selecting the blue out of the branches? I can't seem to get the detail that you have.

kdog

Well, that's a mighty fine composite, Leonard. Great idea and execution.

rwells

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