Week 5: Example 3 - Sun Moon Lake: View from the Temple

[leeharper_admin]

On the whole I think that this correction is ok. The bark of the tree on the right has a green cast in places though, and I didn't know how to get rid of it - so (as always) there's room for improvement (suggestions most welcome ;))...

I began by duplicating the background layer in Photoshop, setting the background copy to 'Multiply', and adding a layer mask - to which I applied the Red channel (which I then blurred). The purpose of this was to improve the sky.

I next ran the Shadow/Highlight command using the ACT recommended settings, to open up the trees, and improve the clouds.

Now, into CurveMeister. The first pass was in RGB - and was a by-the-numbers correction; the second pass was in Lab, with a contrast boost on the L. I also ran the saturation slider to 1.40. The saturation boost looked bad in the darker areas of the image, so I used the L channel to mask these areas from the boost.

I finished up with a bit of sharpening (nothing fancy)...

Let me know how I can improve this  :)
Lee.

[ggroess]

You have covered this image pretty well.  So let's go all subjective on this one...

Personally....I would brighten it a bit...the contrast in the foreground and the bright sun in the background suggest a middle of the day lighting to possibly mid-afternoon.  It seems like the brightness is off just a touch...to me the 3/4 tones are too dark.  I tried a few variations on this and decided that it was up to you to decide but here was my suggestion.....and I may have gone too far....

Greg