For the next few days, I’m giving myself a bit of a Christmas vacation, while I will be visiting my parents. So there will be no new photos or articles, only reposts of older, mostly Christmas themed photos.
For today, a Christmas tree photo from the Central shopping center in Bratislava.
For today, I will show you how this photo from the back side of the Hungarian parliament was edited. So let’s get to it :)
This shot was taken by placing the camera around 1-2cm above the new fountain that is right behind the parliament. I had to wait a moment, as the water stream is not always the same, and it only creates a nice reflection when it slows down. Also I had to wait until the military patrol passes by, so I don’t have them in the shot (felt a little like a game there :)).
So when you compare the final and the original photo, you will see what needed to be corrected. The scene had quite a huge dynamic range, as night shots usually have. I wanted to tone down the lights, and get some color into the sky. I also wanted to remove some of the distractions from the shot, like flares and the tent on the right.
I started as always in Lightroom. Here I removed the chromatic aberrations and applied lens corrections. From there I continued in Oloneo Photoengine. Here it did wonderful job combining the shots, but the colors got a bit too strong. So I used the Natural HDR mode to tone them down, but also saved the more colorful version, to use in Photoshop to add color partially.
From here I continued in Photoshop with following edits (layers numbered from bottom up):
1. Oloneo Photoengine result in Natural HDR mode
2. The more colorful result, but set to 30% opacity, to get more color.
3+4+5. Retouched out a light trail on the left and a moving flag. Also removed lens flares on the right.
6+7. -1EV and +2EV to remove ghosting from moving flags.
8. Darkened the bright lights from the -2EV exposure
9+10+11. Selected a part from the left size, flipped it and transformed to fit the right side, over the tent. Then used the clone stamp, to create more of the floor in front of it.
12. Color efex pro contrast to get a bit more detail in the sky, and more local contrast.
13. More overall contrast using curves.
14. I felt the bright areas became a bit too dark after all the edits, so I used the original HDR result to brighten them back up.
15. A bit more exposure on the sky, to make it brighter.
16. And to finish a bit more exposure overall using curves.
And that’s all I did with this image. To find out more on how I edit, check out the guides and before after categories on this blog, or check out my video tutorial series here:
Over the years I added a lot of different stuff to the blog, and some of those got a bit lost under all the other stuff. So let me refresh the Zoomable panoramas section today, with a new zoomable panorama. This time it’s a zoomable 120Mpix panorama from the Dubai marina, taken late at night. You can find it here, and all the other panoramas are here.
Here you can zoom in into this huge photo and enjoy all the great details in it.
Use your mouse wheel to scroll and hold and drag the mouse to move around. You can also use the buttons under the image to zoom and move. For the best experience, I suggest switching to full screen view first. To do so, use the second button from the right.
Please note, this loads a lot of smaller images, so it can taken few seconds to fully load the files.
I though I would share with you my first thoughts on the Everyday messenger bag today, but as the delivery is late and I don’t know where it is (btw. what is the point of tracking, if they delivery company does not include the location in the updates? ), that would have to wait. So for today, here you have a shot of the John Frost bridge from Arnhem in Netherlands.
This is a HDR from 5 exposures, created in Oloneo Photoengine, finished in Photoshop.
Technique: Oloneo Photoengine, Number of exposures: 5, Camera Model: Canon EOS 5D mark II, Lens: Canon 16-35mm F2.8, Focal length: 16mm, Aperture: 11, Middle exposure time: 2.5s, ISO: 100, Tripod used: yes, Location: 51.975237, 5.912495
Subscribe to my newsletter and get a free Capturing fireworks ebook.
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. By continuing to use it, you agree with their usage. Accept
Privacy & Cookies Policy
Privacy Overview
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.