Before & After #538

The game will last 1 week and whoever can produce the best edited image (as judged by me) will be picked as the winner. It will then be their turn to post their unedited picture for all of us to take a crack at. The participants must provide at least a simple breakdown of how they edited the image, please give us all details so we can learn and share tips. For instance if you use the Unsharpen Mask tool or Smart Sharpen, provide us with the adjustments you used so others can try them out. You can post multiple images, but the first image you post will be the one that is judged all other images will be considered for knowledge and tip use only. Feel free to comment and/or ask questions at any time. This is a good competition for learning new methods, so let's make it a bit more dynamic. I will be judging edits, not comments. If you happen to be the winner of the game please start the next one with the title of the game and the following number. For example…the next game should read "Before & After #539". Submissions end, Sunday, July 5th, 2015 when I check the thread, and a winner will be announced soonish after. RAW image here: https://www.dropbox.co​m …5-04-19_07-48-56.CR2?dl=0 (external link)

Looks like a good one. Here's a straight out of camera shot, as a reference.

A 50%-50% blend of Luminance HDR results from the fatal algorithm (detail factor 9.7, pregamma 0.7) with a crop from DPP w/unsharpmask of {6,5,0} and saturation 1.

Taking this in a completely different direction...

Groovy filter!

Wanted to go for a Kodachrome look, LAB mode Curves adjustment, bringing in the range of a and b channels
Did some darkening by painting on to a blank layer set to Multiply blending (haha, and then accidentally merged layers and saved a bunch of shadows that I didn't want - oh well, still learning how to do non-destructive editing. I would have been a lot happier if I hadn't made that mistake!)

Mark, the closer I look at yours, the more I like it. Do you remember which paint efect you used? The rocks and trees came out great!

Thanks,

Koert

cacawcacaw wrote in post #17620590
Mark, the closer I look at yours, the more I like it. Do you remember which paint efect you used? The rocks and trees came out great!

Thanks,

Koert

I dont remember off the top of my head but if i saw the name i would probably remember. I will take a look when I get home tonight.

And the winner is..... mannetti21!

This was not any easy decision. I was going back and forth between mannetti21's "painting" and Koert's Kodachrome.

Okay mannetti21, it's your turn. Please post the next round and keep this going. And once again, congratulations!

DG, thanks for being polite, but it was no contest!

What would you guys think of turning this into single thread, so it would be easier to follow and attract more users? How about retitling the next one simply Before and After, and then we can just do one image after another, perhaps keeping Saturday evening (Sunday morning on the other side of the world) as the end of each round?

Mark, whatever you decide to do, I'll look forward to the next round.

cacawcacaw wrote in post #17620590
Mark, the closer I look at yours, the more I like it. Do you remember which paint efect you used? The rocks and trees came out great!

Thanks,

Koert

Filter is called "Oil paint" under the filter menu in Photoshop. I just tried it on a few other pictures and its definitely something I may eventually try with a print. DGstinner's filtered image would actually look great hanging in my master bathroom.

cacawcacaw wrote in post #17621696
DG, thanks for being polite, but it was no contest!

What would you guys think of turning this into single thread, so it would be easier to follow and attract more users? How about retitling the next one simply Before and After, and then we can just do one image after another, perhaps keeping Saturday evening (Sunday morning on the other side of the world) as the end of each round?

Mark, whatever you decide to do, I'll look forward to the next round.

Thanks for the kind words.

I think that's a great idea. It can be somewhat confusing when looking for the most recent thread and/or going back to track previous edits. Besides simplifying the process, it would be nice to have a collection of the edited images in a single place for learning purposes. I'll start the thread in a few minutes after I browse through my Lightroom and find an image.

Golly! We've resurrected B&A have we? It's been a long time guys.

Some great edits here, but am I the only one seeing a tilted image?

M_Six wrote in post #17623927
Some great edits here, but am I the only one seeing a tilted image?

I think it is somewhat deceiving because of the line created by the waters edge in the background and the actual water of the background. I attempted to correct for the tilt using the top edge of the waterfall as a reference.

M_Six wrote in post #17623927
Some great edits here, but am I the only one seeing a tilted image?

I don't see it, but that doesn't mean it's not tilted.

Where's a reference though? The trees all seem to be evenly balanced and for every one leaning in one direction, there's another leaning in the opposite direction. And the waterfall doesn't help much because there's no way to know if the edge is perpendicular to the camera.

I didn't even think about trying to adjust the image for level, but I don't have any intuitive feeling for which way I'd rotate it, if at all.