Dan's Outside

Photo trickery?

Virga over Owens Valley. August 12, 2004.

Just for fun, here’s the original version of this shot, more or less as it came from the camera. The light was terrible and I had to underexpose a lot to avoid blowing out the sunlit areas in the distance.

Basically, I ended up working the image in four parts: the snow field, which needed to be brighter and have more contrast; the sky and distant mountains which needed additional contrast; the foreground which needed some color, contrast, and detail; and the intermediate ridge, which needed more contrast and to remain dark so that it would stand out a bit from the foreground.

What did the scene really look like at the time? Probably not exactly like either of the images. If it really looked like the lower image, do you think I would have bothered takng a picture? ;-)

My recollection of what it seemed like at the time is more like the upper image, though it clearly amplifies the effect. Provoking a reaction to the image that is closer to my experience of being there led me to create the upper version.

So, which do you like best? ;-)
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August 20, 2004 - Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary