can this image be rescued?

kiem · October 27, 2009

I was aiming for the water, didnt have any filter for the top part of the photograph. I've tried using LR to bring down by couple fstops on the top portion then the image is really ugly.

Zayets · October 27, 2009

Here is a rough attempt. Hope you like it.

Richard · October 27, 2009

It's hard to tell from such a small version, but if you mean "can I end up with a natural looking landscape?" I'm afraid the answer is no. The problem is that not only is the sky blown, but so are the fine branches in some of the trees, so there are leaves that are free floating. Forget Photoshop heroics--go back and shoot it again. Looks like there are worse places to be.

BinaryFx · October 27, 2009

kiem wrote:

I was aiming for the water, didnt have any filter for the top part of the photograph. I've tried using LR to bring down by couple fstops on the top portion then the image is really ugly.

Kiem, you mention LR...did you shoot in raw format? If so, what happens when you introduce MAJOR negative exposure values and or maximum highlight recovery values?

Is the image posted a JPEG produced by the camera? With the right time and budget, major retouching/faking can be attempted. Richard is correct, the best practice is to do the work in-camera the first time...however one can't always
revisit a scene or place in time to take a new shot.

Contact me offlist if you have the raw, I would be happy to look deeper into this shot.

As I am a hack (I usually work with photos, I don't often take them), I would have used bracketed JPEG exposures and a raw, as I don't have a filter for my "toy" camera.

Regards,

Stephen Marsh

members.ozemail.com.au/~binaryfx
prepression.blogspot.com

kiem · October 27, 2009

Zayets,

Is that some kind of filter you use in Photoshop? That's not bad at all if I consider scavaging this photo for some special effects.

Richard, you're right, I cannot have a natural looking photograph. Reshooting is not an option right now because I'd have to drive 2 hours to get there.

Per BinaryFX's suggestion - yes I shot in raw. I brought the whole photo's exposure down by 3.5 fstops, Fill Lights up by 100%, and Blacks to 100%, then used the Adjustment Brush to bring the overblown portion down by another 2 fstops, and increased some Clarity - this is what it comes up. What a big difference. Although this photo is still not useful to me - it's nice to know there are things that can be done; just this one is extremely overblown.

Thanks to all.

BinaryFx · October 27, 2009

kiem wrote:

Zayets,

Is that some kind of filter you use in Photoshop? That's not bad at all if I consider scavaging this photo for some special effects.

Kiem, I would bet that Zayets (over)used the free third party Adaptive Equalization filter from Reindeer Graphics, in order to try to get some detail...this filter is fantastic, when used in a more subtle fashion, it really brings out detail, however it can really bring out noise and garbage from JEPG compression too!

www.reindeergraphics.com (free plugins menu on the right of the main page)

Per BinaryFX's suggestion - yes I shot in raw. I brought the whole photo's exposure down by 3.5 fstops, Fill Lights up by 100%, and Blacks to 100%, then used the Adjustment Brush to bring the overblown portion down by another 2 fstops, and increased some Clarity - this is what it comes up. What a big difference. Although this photo is still not useful to me - it's nice to know there are things that can be done; just this one is extremely overblown.

Thanks to all.

For a more natural feel, I would do two renders from LR. One at 0 EV or whatever...then second using highlight recovery and or negative exposure. Then I would layer the two renders over the top of each other in Photoshop and merge them, taking advantage of the best of both. I would not try to do everything in the one render from LR or ACR. I would use each tool to it's maximum advantage...LR for rendering data with highlight detail and Photoshop for combining the data from two or more renders for a more natural look. There are many tutorials to be found on exposure blending etc.

I am glad that you have seen some of the possibilities here Kiem! When it comes to blown highlights, raw capture can offer 2 or more stops of flexibility. Most cite white balance as being the best part of raw, however for me it is exposure.

EDIT: Attached is a quick example of blending your first image with your latest image (small/subtle masked adapt. equilization and "smart" noise added, with sky colouring).

Sincerely,

Stephen Marsh

members.ozemail.com.au/~binaryfx
prepression.blogspot.com

Zayets · October 29, 2009

kiem wrote:

Zayets,

Is that some kind of filter you use in Photoshop? That's not bad at all if I consider scavaging this photo for some special effects.

I used Lucis Art 3 to do what I did.

My hat goes off to you for what you did with the raw file. Well done.

can this image be rescued?

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