Before & After 341

This game is to help those of us who are trying to learn new editing tricks.

Here's the breakdown of the game. I will post a picture, re-sized to exactly 1000 pixels maximum on the long side. Outside of being re-sized it has to be unedited...meaning no adjustments to any levels, it has to look like it did as it came out of the camera.

The game will last 4 Days (96 hrs) and whoever can produce the best edited image (as judged by me) will be picked and it'll be their turn to post their unedited picture for all of us to take a crack at.

The participants must have their "Image Editing OK" turned on and they must provide at least a simple breakdown of how they edited the image, some entrants are a little vague on this point, please give us all details so we can learn and share tips. For instance if you use the unsharp 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.

Also, please keep all comments, be they positive or negative, to yourself until after the game has ended.

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 #342.

This game ends February 5th at 7 pm GMT

Here's a link to a larger file to work with :-

http://www.flickr.com …/35528148@N00/5​407598321/

No guidelines - there's tons to work on here - have fun!

Here you go!

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Went a different direction with this to try out the "Render light sources" filter in PSE. Other than monkeying with the light settings for way too long, just some simple saturation and contrast adjustments along with a little softening of the image. Oh yeah, I also did a bit of vertical perspective control and that required a re-crop. I was hoping to pull off a believable night shot, so hopefully I got close here.

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What a difficult photo to work with!!! couldnt find the main object, was it the tree? the church? the people??. But that is the Idea, Thanks.
I played a lot with colors and filters to try to get a very old look of it. Color balane, oleo paint filter, BW convertion, Added noise, newspaper look....

My try...
duplicated original
unsharp mask (Radius 5, amount .2, threshold 0)
curves adjust
cloned and cloned and cloned (people, both bikes, trash can, added stairs)
used perspective tool to straighten building
cloned from background (original pic) to fill in gaps from perspective tool
added black border to frame
flattened
when I uploaded to flickr, it looked soft so I ran another unsharp mask and reposted to flickr.

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/21905076@N04/5​411611537/

Stayed in Lightroom for this one. Lens correction, cropping, sharpening, vibrance, noise reduction, vignetting.

Brightened the leaning bike and the couple to create a lead to a focal point.

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Fixed lens distortion, adjusted WB, Exposure, recovery, vibrance, clarity in ACR.
Cloned out people, bikes.
Shadow/Highlights
Boost color in LAB. Unsharp mask in LAB

Great selection of edits this week.

Madboy1827 - very vivid green and enhanced yellows.
tkbslc - Well worked evening conversion , good straightening as well.
Surgeonhawkeye - you're right, it was a difficult shot and when I took it I wanted the tree and the house but without people, so you can wee where we're going here. Well thought out, the newspaper look though.
jb2u - Nicely straightened and good cloning that's a good job.
cacawcacaw - I like the crop on this one and also the straightening. The exposure adjustment seems just a bit on the light side though.
sllo - Much the same as for jb2u really except that I like the crop and I'm a fan of the colour boost so its all yours this week and if you're unable to post, my second choice is jb2u.

All I need to do now is convert my own edit....

Well done everyone.

Thanks Nigel. Where was this photo taken? Hope that you'll post your final edit.

I considered cloning out some elements but then decided that I liked the people, bicycles, and trash receptacle because I think they help "tell the story". (I just watched a seminar on YouTube where the photographer stresses "filling the frame" and "telling the story".) Nonetheless, great cloning jobs. That must have been fairly difficult and time consuming.

I, too, was impressed with the silo's exposure/colors.

Congratulations sllo!! Great job everyone.

My late addition, but I thought the PhotoTools "Monet" filter was nice. Just figured I'd share.

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/34526449@N06/5​420268728/

Thanks guys ans great job everyone.
B&A #342 is up. Have fun!!!

cacawcacaw wrote in post #11783500
Thanks Nigel. Where was this photo taken? Hope that you'll post your final edit.

I considered cloning out some elements but then decided that I liked the people, bicycles, and trash receptacle because I think they help "tell the story". (I just watched a seminar on YouTube where the photographer stresses "filling the frame" and "telling the story".) Nonetheless, great cloning jobs. That must have been fairly difficult and time consuming.

I, too, was impressed with the silo's exposure/colors.

Hi, the photo was taken in Corfu town last September - there were so many people around but I couldn't wait long enough for a blank canvas so thought I'd clone them out. I agree, the guys did a great cloning job.

@cacawcacaw

Here's my edit

Nigel, I like your tree colors far better than mine. I think I need to start having short editing sessions where I can come back and look at my work after some time has passed.

(The next challenge is a baby which I converted to a wax figurine. The edit looked good while I was doing it but looked horrible the next day.)

And I like that you left the bicycles in place - tells a story. : )

Corfu - My only trip to Europe was 25 years ago and I passed on Greece and the British Isles because my Rail Pass didn't work there. Biggest mistake of my life!