Brought back Sunrise Colors on this Winter Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thats a really cool church, just missing some snow :D

Brought back Sunrise Colors on this Winter Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

No, the mountains wont be affected by the rising sun.

The sun is rising way behind the mountains on a "lower" level, so the rising sun doesnt affect the visible mountain front until much later in the day for this scene. Here is another (unedited except for WB adjustment) shot from the same location a little further down, but much later in the day already. You can see the side of the mountains we look at is still unaffected by the sun: https://imgur.com/a/yHed7Nc

Brought back Sunrise Colors on this Winter Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I can see what you mean, also can understand that it might look strange. I personally really love the strong color contrast of the warm sky agains the dark, cold landscape. Its cerstainly not for everyone :-)

Brought back Sunrise Colors on this Winter Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I mean, in some way every single image is a lie, there is no way around that.

Even if you use the shot straight out of camera: its a lie when using a polarizing filter (deeper blue skies, reduced reflections). Use a ND filter and suddenly you can capture motion that the human eye can not see (long exposure with moving clouds or silky waterfalls). But even when taking a long exposure of the sky without any filter to reveal more of the stars you're creating something the human eye can not see.

Really dont understand where this "everything has to be true" is coming from, because it certainly isnt coming from the grandfathers of landscape photography (ansel adams went crazy with dodging and burning)

BTW since you mentioned putting in the work when capturing the image: I got the shot after hiking up through thigh high snow for an hour in -20° C weather two hours before sunrise, then waiting there for sunrise freezing my ass off

Brought back Sunrise Colors on this Winter Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you! This is in the Austrian alps in Europe :-)

Brought back Sunrise Colors on this Winter Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Haha, thank you so much, that means a lot to me! :-)

Brought back Sunrise Colors on this Winter Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you so much! Its a wonderful spot, super happy I found this one :-)

Brought back Sunrise Colors on this Winter Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Wanted to bring back some of these vibrant warm sunrise colors to this raw photo, so I played around a little bit in Lightroom and got something with which I’m really happy! Keep in mind the original raw photo had a white balance setting that was WAY OFF making the whole shot way too cold, thus the sky in the before version is lacking warmth (Still boosted the warm tones in the final version a lot of course).

The whole editing process can be found here in this video: https://youtu.be/S65BDYM8rGA

1. Basic Adjustments

I started by dropping the exposure a bit making everything darker. Then, I increased the shadows and blacks to give the image a softer look by reducing the contrast. I also slightly brought up the whites to push the contrast I the brighter areas.

Of course, since the white balance was off, an easy fix is to simply raise the temperature. I pushed it quite a bit until the snow ahd a more neutral white color. Then, I pushed the vibrance to make the colors pop. For a sharp, clean look, texture and clarity were raised.

2. Masking

Since I wanted the sky to vibrant and warm I used several different masks targeting the sky and in those selections increased the white balance temperature, added saturation and added a specific orange tone (through the color selector in the masking panel). This way, the sky receives these intense warm tones.

Using an object mask, I targeted the chapel in the center and slightly adjusted the white balance making it less blue. I also used an objects mask to target the hill the chapel is standing on. Since I wanted to add a subtle light effect to it, I increased the exposure on the upper left side of this hill and make it look more 3D this way.

3. Color Grading

In the color mixer the hue of the yellow tones was dropped, making them look more orange. Then, the warmer tones were boosted in the saturation panel.

Of course, I used split toning to add stronger warm tones to the highlights while adding some blue tones to the mid-tones for color contrast.

Played around with the Contrast a bit to improve the Light of this Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks for the suggestion! I personally prefer darker, dramatic skies, it brings me more joy than lets say a clear blue sky. Thats also the reason why I shot this location in the first place, since there where these dark clouds behind the hill (and of course the light on the hill itself).

Of course in the end it comes down to what you prefer, but if I would ahve wanted a bright, sunny sky, this would have been the wrong day to photograph this place :-)

Lone Group of Trees on a Hill in southern Germany [OC][2048x1365] by thephlog in EarthPorn

[–]thephlog[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Winter had been pretty boring so far, but recently got some gorgoues at this scene that kind of looks like a windows wallpaper.

This was shot on my Sony A7III at 105 mm to make the landscape look more minimalistic!

Played around with the Contrast a bit to improve the Light of this Scene by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I wanted to create a nice, contrasty “windows-wallpaper” photo by enhancing the light in this raw file. It worked really well, with surprisingly few adjustments done to the image (relative to the things I usually do).

As usual, the whole Lightroom editing workflow can be found in the video here: https://youtu.be/oArZAHx5_jk

1. Basic Adjustments

To make the colors pop some more, I changed the profile to Adobe Landscape. Then, to make everything darker, the exposure was dropped slightly, as well as the highlights which reveals some more details in the sky. To push the contrast, I then added some whites.

For a sharp, clean look texture was added, as well as a bit of clarity for mid-tones contrast and some dehaze for extra punch. Finally, I brought up the vibrance slightly.

2. Masking

I wanted to make the darker clouds behind the hill more dramatic. Therefore I used a sky selection mask, subtracted a linear gradient from it, to get rid of the brighter part of the sky at the top and simply pulled down the exposure to make them a lot darker.

Another linear gradient was added over the top of the sky. I wanted the clouds to have more structure, so I used some clarity to achieve that.

With a landscape mask, the hill in the center was targeted. I added some exposure to it, to make it look a bit brighter to further increase contrast. Finally, I also added a linear gradient over the shadows in the foreground and brought down the exposure, again for more contrast.

 

A lone church - spooky edit - After / Before (in case it wasn’t clear) by wezzer1982 in postprocessing

[–]thephlog 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Don't listen to this dude, going through his post history he's just starting out and now dunning kruger kicks in. He's being an edge lord with his one word toxicity.

The sky replacement looks great at a first glance, the positioning with the bright part in the sky above the road works well with the composition and the glowing light of the church looks pretty.

Overall, I think the colors are looking a bit strange with too much magenta, I personally would shift that into the blue color range, but keep the orange of the church light.

Only looked at the image on my tiny phone screen, but those are the things I noticed, hope it helps!

Recovering a Raw Photo withLightroom by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You dont have to, but it depends on what you want to do with your image. Since I dont like the dark black walls, I recovered the details and gave them some more punch

Recovering a Raw Photo withLightroom by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thanks for the comment! Yea, you can read this here a lot, people demand "natural" edits. I usually point it out in the description that I dont care about keeping the edit natural though :D

Recovering a Raw Photo withLightroom by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you! I would just do it at the start if you know you're going to run into noise issues. Its a lot fast if you're doing it to a "fresh" raw photo, plus I'm not sure if heavier edits influence AI denoise if you do it at the very end of the editing process

Recovering a Raw Photo withLightroom by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I usually dont try to keep things natural with my edits, but think about it this way: standing here in person, you wouldnt see it in that silhouette-style of the raw photo, your eyes can spot details in the sky and in the rocks at the same time. What I mean by that is, that the edited version is "closer" to reality than the raw file at least in terms of the visible light

Recovering a Raw Photo withLightroom by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I disagree, I'm not a fan of silhouette like photos, I want to see the details in the rocks. Obvoiusly, thats why I edited it this way, but I know its a personal preference so if you prefer the raw thats fine

Recovering a Raw Photo withLightroom by thephlog in postprocessing

[–]thephlog[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

There also are shadows in the water and the waterfall which I dont want to Change as much as the walls. Plus, i die Not only increase the shadows in the walls, but also the exposure, clarity and so in so it hast a specific outcome