Critique wanted on Schabacher image

[Ben Egbert]

Like your help and critique on this image. The first is as posted elsewhere where it was generally liked, but a few thought it was HDR or too bright in the shadows. It was always a single none blended image, but made bright and warm for printing. I started over with web in mind and would like it judged on that basis.

In order they are

1. As posted earlier, and printed, bright and warm.

2. Raw

3. As converted in ACR

4. As finished darker and cooler than original.

 

[JimFox]

Hey Ben, it's nice to see the progression here. It's always cool to see the raw image and how it progresses to the finished product.

I wouldn't have thought that your original version was an HDR. They greens are a bit too bright, so I like how you toned that down a bit and darkened it slightly in your modified finished version (#4).

Jim

 

[Ben Egbert]

Thanks Jim. I keep my work flow geared to print and my monitor dark so I tend to get things a bit bright for web. I hope this presentation is what you want to see on a critique forum.

 

[Jeffrey]

Ben, the last two are hardly different, telling me that there was minimal work done in PS. Your result appears very photo-realistic but not necessarily artistically interpreted. Local contrast adjustments and color correction/saturation might make this stand out a bit more. I would clone out some of the grasses on the right side of the front left group to give a little more space around the reflection of the peak. This is a classic calendar shot.

 

[Ben Egbert]

Thanks jeffrey, I was trying to avoid overprocessing. I would expect that the first seems to be an example of that. I never thought of cloning out that grass, I did clone out a lot of floating debris I will give you suggestions a try.

 

[Ben Egbert]

Here is an attempt to follow jeffries suggestions.