(1/2 sec @ f/22; ISO 100; 0 EV; FL 43mm)
Image was made yesterday morning at Lake Galena in Peace Valley Park (Bucks County, PA) in the minutes before sunrise. The lake obviously was frozen.
Used my Canon 50D; 24-70 2.8L w/ a 3-stop graduated neutral density filter; all tripod mounted.
When I got home and looked at the images on the big screen, I felt they were cold, desolate, lonely and boring. I wanted cold, desolate, lonely and less boring. So I went to work. I started with cropping out some of the excess ice in the foreground in order to provide a better balance. Then I ran the image through Nik Dfine to remove any noise that may have presented itself. Moving on to Viveza 2.0, I opened up the blacks in the trees on the left and right and reduced brightness while adding saturation to the ice and sky accentuating the blues and reds. I also reduced structure a bit in order to start smoothing the ice blemishes. After contenting myself that I did what I wanted to do in Viveza, I moved on to Color Efex Pro. I said that I had used a 3-stop GND while shooting but felt it could use a bit more so I used the Graduated ND filter in Nik and finished it off by softening and smoothing the image using a filter designed, I think, for portraits called Glamour Glow. Finally I used Sharpener Pro to, believe it or not, reduce the structure and focus a bit more in order to reduce the impact of the ice blemishes even more – much like a portrait photographer would do to remove skin blemishes.
“Fire and Ice” is the result. Remember… cold, desolate, lonely. Let me know what you think!
Cold, desolate, lonely… BEAUTIFUL, and not boring at all!
Quiet and peaceful comes to mind, too.
I love the colors. Maybe it feels a bit heavy on the blue foreground, but much cropping will take out the deeper hues. I like the smoothing effects – glassy effect feels right.
Wow! Surreal, gorgeous colors, cold, and such a beautiful glass look. Beautiful and pop with the effects. I love it!
Very cool shot. I love the contrast in colors, and the dreamy almost alien feel to the whole shot.
Very colorful and dreamy. I like it!
Beautiful image! I like it a lot. ‘Reaching for my skates…
Hi Ed, I like the contrast between colours and also the soft look. Together with the smooth surface of frozen lake it gives a pleasant feeling. I wonder how it would look with the brown cast over the sky removed or changed to red.
Wow Ed, you are an artist! These two last landscape you published are fantastic. This last one is just perfect and beautifully colored. Gosh you got your camera in hand! Well done mate!
Very pretty – the colors are super.
Beautiful image Ed, I love the cool and warm contrast in this, wonderful work !!
I love the image, Ed. It has an otherworldly look.
Cold, desolate, lonely and beautiful. Great work!