Gloomy Punggol

[oliprolli]

Went to Punggol Beach a few days ago to catch the sunrise but the skies were dark and it was drizzling. Captured this with HDR and converted to black and white. Its my 1st time trying HDR and any PP would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

 

[ortega]

not gloomy enough, but some pp will correct

 

[oliprolli]

Aaah! looks much better! Wld u care to share the workflow?

 

[ortega]

Aaah! looks much better! Wld u care to share the workflow?

there are two sections
the sky and the beach/rocks

darken the sky and add contrast
lighten the beach and bring out tones on the rocks
some selective sharpening on the rocks

these are done via various selection and layers to acheive
no formula sorry

but first is to decide what needs to be done and then execute it

 

[oliprolli]

thanks for the tip bro. i think i know what u mean

 

[espion]

actually I like ur version better - softer, and more melancholic. ortega's version is rather harsh to my eyes, especially the foreground, which is too bright, but a little darker skies is OK. The other thing is the cut-off front rock. Could it be better to have the whole rock and even more to the right? I think we can cut off the diminishing far rocks without changing the composition.

PS: Your sambal belachan icon rocks!

 

[oliprolli]

hey thanks for the imput! That was the feel that i was going for actually. i wanted to blur the rocks even more but then i thought id be criticised for having my pic out of focus. I did quite a lot of pp on this pic as there were many undesirable things in the frame. I agree with you that itd be better if i had more of the rock on the lower right. Will keep it in mind the next time i go there. Thanks!