Preston Mill, East Linton, Scotland

[rudgej]

There has been a mill on the site since the 16th century, but this one dates from the 18th century, and was in commercial use until 1959. :shock:

http://www.johnrudge.f2s.com/coppermine/albums/userpics/prestonmill.jpg

[weemannie]

A lovely old building, John. Glad to see you back on home ground ;) :D

[Reigh Higgins]

Beautiful stone building John. Thanks for sharing.

[andydajo]

Nice capture John, did you use any ND Grads for the sky??

[Dimitri_V]

There has been a mill on the site since the 16th century, but this one dates from the 18th century, and was in commercial use until 1959. :shock:
The year i was born eh?
I thought i was the only one out of commision.:lol:

Nice one John,though i would saturate it a wee touch to bring out the lovely colours of the place.

[Permagrin]

Very lovely. It has everything...saturation, proper exposure, excellent subject & location, location, location! ;)

[Larry_NB]

Great shot. The stories such a building could tell.

[rudgej]

A lovely old building, John. Glad to see you back on home ground ;) :D
Thanks Trevor. I promise that my next few outings will be Scotland based. ;)
Beautiful stone building John. Thanks for sharing.
My pleasure Reigh.
Nice capture John, did you use any ND Grads for the sky??
Yep, 2-stop with -0.67 stops of exposure bias and the odd CP thrown in too.
The year i was born eh?
I thought i was the only one out of commision.:lol:

Nice one John,though i would saturate it a wee touch to bring out the lovely colours of the place.
Scary isn't it. I've seen things in the museum in Edinburgh that I've used when growing up. The original does look a bit more saturated.
Very lovely. It has everything...saturation, proper exposure, excellent subject & location, location, location! ;)
Thanks Permagrin. :)
Great shot. The stories such a building could tell.
I wish. This is the second time I've visited and it has now closed for winter.

[Frank_Hollahan]

Ya got to love the stone work in some of these old buildings, lovely and interesting shot John.

[J T]

Yep, 2-stop with -0.67 stops of exposure bias and the odd CP thrown in too.



Seems I still have a LOT to learn. I have no idea what that means...care to explain to the less educated learning folk? :oops:

Nice capture, John. What did the mill process when it was in service? I like how the water came out in this shot...it looks very...hmm, how should I put it...uhh, wet? ;-) The ripples add a very appealing texture.

[Lesmac]

I like how the ripples pull you into the image, and a fascinating building.
The roof line on the main building (right one) looks a little soft?

[Meerkat17]

Nice classic view of Preston Mill John, the colours are wonderful, I have some old 35mm B&W shots of the same view from several years back.:D

[rudgej]

Seems I still have a LOT to learn. I have no idea what that means...care to explain to the less educated learning folk? :oops:

Nice capture, John. What did the mill process when it was in service? I like how the water came out in this shot...it looks very...hmm, how should I put it...uhh, wet? ;-) The ripples add a very appealing texture.
The "exposure bias" is the description given in the exif data for under-exposing by (in this case) 2/3s of a stop which can have the effect of giving a bit more saturation to the colours. The water might look "wet" because I selected it, feathered by 200 pixels, and then adjusted the gamma slider slightly on the levels adjustment.

I like how the ripples pull you into the image, and a fascinating building.
The roof line on the main building (right one) looks a little soft?
Thanks Les, and you're most probably correct as my USM skills are minimal and so sometimes I don't even bother with any (other than what the raw processing might do by default). Do you have any recommendations as to a good way to tackle the issue of USM?

Nice classic view of Preston Mill John, the colours are wonderful, I have some old 35mm B&W shots of the same view from several years back.:D
Thanks David. That particular viewpoint must be a pretty common one to stand at. ;)

[Buggbairn]

Thanks Les, and you're most probably correct as my USM skills are minimal and so sometimes I don't even bother with any (other than what the raw processing might do by default). Do you have any recommendations as to a good way to tackle the issue of USM?


It's a braw wee building John, would make an excellent holiday retreat when I win the lottery :lol:

I see your aperture was set at f6.3, I'm no expert but could that be the reason for a little softness ? maybe too shallow a depth of field ?

What I do in terms of USM is a little trick Dimitri learned me called local contrast (I think) Amount > 20 Radius > 50 Threshold > 0 this adds a little sharpenning and boosts the contrast a little at the same time, give it a go :)

[rudgej]

Thanks Scottie, and I'll give the settings a try. The reason for the f/6.3 was simply because I was shooting hand-held (and wanted to keep ISO down and shutter speed up) and I thought that the distance would be okay for this aperture. For instance if you click on the dof data link for the 17-40 in my sig, then f/6.3 at 17mm when focussed on infinity should be okay from about 1.4m onwards. Hopefully any softness might just be from shooting in raw and not post-processing the right amount of sharpening in.

[rudgej]

What I do in terms of USM is a little trick Dimitri learned me called local contrast (I think) Amount > 20 Radius > 50 Threshold > 0 this adds a little sharpenning and boosts the contrast a little at the same time, give it a go :)
I've just had a try at these settings, and my first thought was that the original looked okay as is, so perhaps I just need some sharpening for the small web images. When I did try the 20/50/0, I found that I was losing some detail with some of the fence posts which looked blown out afterwards. I've tried some recommended defaults in the past, but the trouble is that I thnk that you should really understand what the settings are doing and individually tweak them on an individual basis, and this is where I need to spend more time on.

[Tsmith]

Nice photo you've got here John ... good job.

[Raindancer]

Great shot John, love the colours and composition especially the ripples. Like Les says, they definitely lead your eye across the picture.:)

Rog

[rudgej]

Thank you Toney and Rog.

[Elisabeth-Ann]

Beautiful postcard image of a lovely old building.

[rudgej]

Thank you EA, and I notice you've updated your avatar - would I be right in guessing that it is more recent than your last one? ;)

[Lesmac]

Thanks Les, and you're most probably correct as my USM skills are minimal and so sometimes I don't even bother with any (other than what the raw processing might do by default). Do you have any recommendations as to a good way to tackle the issue of USM?

I think the overall sharpness is OK, what I would suggest is you use a sharpening brush , size around 15, normal mode and strenghth of 20% and lightly go along the roof line.

[rudgej]

I think the overall sharpness is OK, what I would suggest is you use a sharpening brush , size around 15, normal mode and strenghth of 20% and lightly go along the roof line.
I guess this is where my lack of PP skills show up as I've no idea where to find the sharpening brush. :confused:

[Lesmac]

I guess this is where my lack of PP skills show up as I've no idea where to find the sharpening brush. :confused:

Here :)

[rudgej]

Thanks Les. :)

[Neilyb]

Nice image John, I agree with the sharpening of the buildings, and perhaps I would have underexposed a little more - it's quite a bright shot you got there (on my monitor).

[rudgej]

Nice image John, I agree with the sharpening of the buildings, and perhaps I would have underexposed a little more - it's quite a bright shot you got there (on my monitor).
Thanks Neil. I was already 2/3 stop under, so perhaps it is more down to my limited PP abilities with the levels adjustment. ;)

[catsith]

nice shot!

[CarolP]

Lovely shot! I enjoy seeing some of the old buildings from Europe and love to hear the history behind them.

[rudgej]

Thank you Tina and Carol. :)

[HrcRacing]

The rippled water and the tall grasses on the right make for a great foreground/lead in on this one John. The building is also quite interesting and you've done a great job of controlling the sky. :grin:

[Elisabeth-Ann]

Thank you EA, and I notice you've updated your avatar - would I be right in guessing that it is more recent than your last one? ;)

Ah you spotted it too :oops: Yeah, this one is up to date, took it yesterday.:confused:

[rudgej]

The rippled water and the tall grasses on the right make for a great foreground/lead in on this one John. The building is also quite interesting and you've done a great job of controlling the sky. :grin:
Thanks Robert. I had the CP and ND grad on anyway, so the sun (which was off to the right wasn't a problem.
Ah you spotted it too :oops: Yeah, this one is up to date, took it yesterday.:confused:
I did indeed, and without meaning any insult, you look prettier now than then - which I hasten to add was just the 1970s-80s style of course. ;)