Kamakura's Great Buddha

cmr164

The first shot is probably a stereotype but the in the others I let my imagination roam.

ISO 320 , f/11 , 1/500 , 23mm , 17-35 f/2.8L


ISO 320 , f/6.3 , 1/800 , 500mm , 500 f/4.0L IS


ISO 320 , f/9.0 , 1/1250 , 500mm


ISO 320 , f/9.0 , 1/1250 , 500mm


ISO 320 , f/11 , 1/500 , 32mm


ISO 640 , f/8.0 , 1/1000 , 500mm , 500 f/4.0L IS


There are more

wxwax

You know, Charles, my small screen slightly cropped the first one, and as a result made it very powerful. The branches framing the Buddha's head work very well.

cmr164

wxwax wrote:

You know, Charles, my small screen slightly cropped the first one, and as a result made it very powerful. The branches framing the Buddha's head work very well.

None of these shots are cropped in post. In fact there is no post at all. I did like the framing of the head which is why I waited and waited and waited for the 2 second window when I could take the shot without tourists in the photo.

cmr164

Ctritiques... things to change... stuff to do in post?

bfjr

I think the one with hands is the most powerful and needs no crop IMHO

I think the second shot would be better cropped showing only one eye, instead of 1 1/2, again JMO

cmr164

bfjr wrote:

I think the one with hands is the most powerful and needs no crop IMHO

Thanks. It was a real trial to handhold the 1DMII and the 500 f/4.0 steady enough to frame the shot. (5.1 kilos / 11.2 lbs) But I am getting better at it. Saturday and Sunday I will be doing surveilance crowd photos for the holy week anti-terrorism efforts here.

bfjr wrote:

I think the second shot would be better cropped showing only one eye, instead of 1 1/2, again JMO

Want to take a try at it? Or does this meet your request?

rutt

Charles, these are all nice. I especially like the off center face and the hands. Both are fine compositions of a powerful subject and both express the deep feeling of this place.

As to post... It's hard to say with these low res versions. The thing that is going to make exquisite large prints here is good detail and just the right sharpening. You have high quality stuff to start with and I know you shoot raw. I also know that you know how to make the L curve steep in the right places and make sure you have good contrast. It looks like you've paid some attention to this, but these are good input and deserve the best from post.

As to sharpening, there is a technique of DM's that I've been liking more and more and which I think will work here. Here is the simplest version:

1. LAB mode
2. Duplicate layer
3. USM, probably too much. You really want to be able to see the white halos.
4. Duplicate the sharpened layer. Now you have three layers, original, and two oversharpened ones.
5. RGB (or CMYK) mode. Don't flatten.
6. Change the blending mode of the middle layer to "darken"
7. Change the blending mode of the top layer to "lighten"
8. Play independently with the opacity of the top two layers until it looks good at 100%

The beauty of this technique is that it gives you independent control over the light and dark sharpening halos. Usually things look oversharpened because of the light halos, so you'll want lower opacity on the top layer. But the dark halos tend to add drama without losing detail or being distracting.

I said this was the simplest form of this technique. You can also independently sharpen each of the channels in seprate layers. You use independent USM parameters for the light and dark layers and for each channel. In short you can go nuts.

In your case, I think the simplest form that I outlined above combined with the right L curve (sharpen last) will give do justice to these images.

pathfinder

cmr164 wrote:

Thanks. It was a real trial to handhold the 1DMII and the 500 f/4.0 steady enough to frame the shot. (5.1 kilos / 11.2 lbs) But I am getting better at it. Saturday and Sunday I will be doing surveilance crowd photos for the holy week anti-terrorism efforts here.


Want to take a try at it? Or does this meet your request?

Very nice images CMR. Was it really necessary to use the 500mm lens - could you not have gotten these same shots with the 70-200 f2.8 L ? Or was it not possible to get that close with the 70-200 zoom?

Shooting landscapes with the 500mm suggests tripod territory to me - that thing is a lot to hand hold, that's for sure!

rutt

Looking again, for the off center face, maybe just a little highlight from the shadow/highlight image adjustment or a little lower exposure in raw conversion. Recover some detain on the nose and other sunwashed parts. You know how to do this as well as I do.

For the hands, I'd try steepeing the A&B LAB curves to make the flowers more saturated. You might want to set some anchor points in the hands themselves first as I think you have nailed this color and don't want anymore satuartion there.

adrian_k

I like what you're trying to do with the last one, for me it's just a little *too* obscured though.

cmr164 wrote:

The first shot is probably a stereotype but the in the others I let my imagination roam.

ISO 640 , f/8.0 , 1/1000 , 500mm , 500 f/4.0L IS


There are more