Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Photoshop Practice
5/365

When I was visiting a friend on Maui last week, we took a drive along some country roads and came across this cute little church.  There was no way to capture the entire structure without including the dull, boring sky, so I just shot away anyway.  I did get a few close-ups, but the charm of the building is really evident when you see the entire structure including the steeple.


Today I decided to open my photoshop manual (what a concept!!) and learn some technique I've never done before.  This is what I came up with.  I'm so psyched.  


I'm not normally a fan of "fake" photos, but when you think about it it's very likely that this could be a real scene.  A rainbow in the sky following a rain or during very cloudy conditions is something  you're likely to see almost every other day in Hawaii.

One of the photographers I admire most is ?????????--yup, his name is just not coming to my memory.  He passed away many years ago in a tragic accident, but he had a great philosophy.  He was a minimalist when it came to post-processing. One of his statements has stuck with me all these years. I wish I could quote him exactly, but basically what he said regarding post-processing is that he only processed a photo to make the image look like his eye saw it when he pressed the shutter button.

Now I know the sky was just plain blah and I didn't see the rainbow that day, but in learning this process I discovered what a joy it can be to enhance a scene with realistic improvements.

Okay, okay, my friends.  Stop gloating!!