in need of some guidance

T

thenamesdaryl

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26
Name
Daryl
Edit My Images
Yes
well i popped down the beach this morning in the lovley -0.5 degrees. got a few shots of the sunrise, i think this is the shot i like the most, however i want to process it to make it lighter and add some colour. i had a quick play in lightroom, not sure if i like the results, thought i would ask for your views and for some advice on where im going wrong. maybe i just took a naff photo! well here they are:
original

origional (1 of 1) by thenamesdaryl, on Flickr
processed

DSC01156 by thenamesdaryl, on Flickr

cheers, Daryl
 
Hi Daryl,

Your original shot isn't to shabby to be honest.
Your processed version looks over saturated and in doing so you have lost a lot of detail in the blacks/shadow areas.

First things first, I would straighten your horizon as its on an eastward slant
Then I would reduce the black slider to bring some of the bottom half detail back.
After that a small tweak with curves and levels will suffice
 
As above.. nice shot to start with. Assuming you're starting with a RAW image..
  1. Straighten horizon.
  2. Put a very slight positive exposure gradient upwards to lighten the foreground a shade.
  3. Don't apply as much vibrancy/saturation - it quickly becomes clownish, you only need a very light touch with these tools
  4. Clean-up the dust-spot(s) - there's a very obvious one about two-thirds up and central
 
You can probably improve things as described above, but the basic problem is dynamic range.

If you'd given it more exposure to lift the shadows, the sun would get blitzed and the sky go too light.

This is a situation when you need a graduated ND filter to darken the sky so that good tones are retained there while you increase the overall exposure to bring out the foregound.

Or you could do it with HDR technique - basically taking over-exposed and under-exposed images and merging them in post processing.
 
did you shoot using raw or jpeg? i have the same camera as you and recently started shooting raw and it has made things a hell of a lot easier come editing time. the sony pmb software for managing raw files is really easy to use so go there's no reason not to.

i like the shot by the way, and fair play for getting out there ;)
 
thanks for the comments, i will sit down and give this a try in a min. yes i am shooting in RAW, yeah lexie i only shoot in raw now, just makes things easier. i dont use the sony software, i've got lightroom 3 and use a plugin for viewing raw in explorer.

i did take some other shots with a higher exposure as i did notice the dark foreground but as you said i noticed the sky just went so bright, ill have a look at one of those filters, sounds like it could be a handy thing to have :) ill post the pic once ive had another crack at it

Daryl
 
ok, so here is what i came out with. i decided to remove a seagull from the horizon as it was so small it looked like a spot, plus 2 other dust spots. straightened it up. got a bit confused with the lights, darks and curve, still not very experienced with them yet, and decided to leave out saturation and vibrance


DSC01156.jpg by thenamesdaryl, on Flickr
 
Had a bit of a go at altering your original, hope you don't mind. Its not great and somehow I've created an odd shadow around the sun.

 
hey, hollis - i did have a small go at gradient, however i've never used it before so was really unsure and seemed to be able to miss what i was going for

tringa - do not mind at all :) it looks interesting, id be intrigued to know what you did to get there?

Daryl
 
Daryl,

I used the Backlight facility on Photoscape and the the graduated filter.

Dave
 
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