Image: Waterfall

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This an often photographed waterfall in the northwest. Comments?

More here : http://www.clarkphoto.com/naturecards/

Cheers,

Keith

-- Keith Clark (ClarkPhotography@spiritone.com), August 16, 1999

Answers

Very nice! At first I thought the bottom should be cropped a little, then decided it's better as is.

What scanner did you use? How big was the final file size used for submission? JPEG?

-- Jim Erhardt (jimerhardt@hotmail.com), August 16, 1999.


Thanks Jim,

I use a Nikon LS-2000 scanner. There are three main points to getting optimal scans with that machine. First, DISABLE "Nikon Color Management" to be able to scan in high-gamut RGB (Nikon's default is a non-standard version of S-RGB). Second, use the gamma control panel in Nikon Scan to adjust each channel individually for the best histogram of each channel. Third, set the "black point" of the Blue channel to a value of about "8" to remove the blue/cyan cast that seems to affect these machines when scanning slides.

No correction in Photoshop other than the normal unsharp masking that all images need (200,1.8,3 @ 2700 PPI) was required.

I use a Photoshop plugin to save JPEG files for the web. It's called "Pegasus", and you can get it from http://www.jpg.com. The Pegasus plugin lets me save files in a fraction of the size they would be otherwise. This image was just over 50K.

BTW, the film was Velvia, and this was shot last Fall, at about 30 seconds @ f22.

Cheers,

Keith

-- Keith Clark (ClarkPhotography@spiritone.com), August 16, 1999.


Great colors! I keep looking for more of the waterfall at the top, but not being familiar with the area, don't know if this was a possibility.

BTW, thanks for the primer on scanning...

-- Scott (bliorg@yahoo.com), August 17, 1999.


I too wanted to crop off the right and the bottom. But I like the two trees on the bottom also. Nice shot.

-- Micheal F. Kelly (Radiant@gci.net), August 17, 1999.

Is it my monitor (or eyes), or is there some blurring to the right (upper, center of image) of the upper part of the waterfall? Is this spray, wind-blown foliage, or a scanning problem? Kind of amazed that there's no reciprocity problem with a 30 second exposure.

Very nice image. Nice composition, flowing water, and exposure.

-- Joe Boyd (boydjw@traveller.com), August 17, 1999.



Joe,

I know what you mean. I see this often in these kinds of shots. I think it's a combination of wind blown foliage and mist. Waterfalls like this often create their own wind because of the temperature gradients associated with them.

Keith

http://www.clarkphoto.com/naturecard/ (Drop in and send a FREE NatureCard!)

-- Keith Clark (ClarkPhotography@spiritone.com), August 17, 1999.


Kieth, very well done. Exposure, composition great. I commend you for the excellent details in the foliage. Very soothing, next best thing to being there! Donna

-- Donna Bollenbach (cassidy@icubed.net), August 18, 1999.

The trees at the bottom make it special. I love Velvia Green.

-- Larry Korhnak (lvk@gnv.ifas.ufl.edu), August 18, 1999.

The elements are wonderful. I agree with Larry, gotta love Velvia greens.

When I look at this, it seems like a frame cropped out of a wider, very good photograph. With the current framing, the image looks a bit crowded or busy to me.

-- Andrew Y. Kim (andy_roo@mit.edu), August 20, 1999.


Thanks everybody for the comments. I think getting more of the scene on film would be a major challenge. The waterfall continues upwards for hudreds of feet. I was using a wide angle lens as it was... ;>

This Fall I'll go back and spend a whole day or two there and try more compositions. As it was, both light and temperatures were falling fast when I finally found the place, and I was a long way from my rig with no survival gear (yeah, dumb).

-- Keith Clark (ClarkPhotography@spiritone.com), August 20, 1999.



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