Need advice please!

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Cristobal

Cristobal

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I took this backlit photo before the pandemia in Yellowstone; in a cold morning, this buffalo seemed to take a steam bath near a hot spring; I would appreciate to receive your suggestions; does this photo has any potential or is it a one-way ticket to the trash? May be a black and white treatment or other....Your feedback will be appreciated!

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It would be cool as a silhouette. I think I would crop the right to where the hills start and clone out the treetops, so it is all fog. And crop up a touch to show less of the ground.
 
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bleirer said:
It would be cool as a silhouette. I think I would crop the right to where the hills start and clone out the treetops, so it is all fog. And crop up a touch to show less of the ground.
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coachjohn57 said:
I would crop it…a bit off the top, a smidge from the bottom, a good bit off the left, and use canvas extension to give the Bison some room to move into…I think a B&W would be an effective treatment. I think it has a lot of potential.
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Thank you for your appreciation and suggestions! I was able to take several pictures that morning; here's another one which I believe takes into account some of your suggestions....

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coachjohn57 said:
I would crop it…a bit off the top, a smidge from the bottom, a good bit off the left, and use canvas extension to give the Bison some room to move into…I think a B&W would be an effective treatment. I think it has a lot of potential.
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What you said…I grabbed it and played with it a bit and that make it much better and definitely a keeper.
 
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Cristobal said:
Another draft, black and white with more cropping to the left...your opinion would be appreciated...
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Like the B&W…but would add more canvas to the right so that the middle of the bison was more or less on the rule of thirds line to the left and content aware fill to give room to be moving into. And I think I would also decrease exposure of the rear quarter to be more silhouette like…but leave the bright fringe on his backside.
 
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Just a quick play..... You can take this image in a lot of different directions. Play and find the presentation you envisioned when you took the image. I did straighten it a bit as it seemed he was walking downhill.

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Butlerkid said:
Just a quick play..... You can take this image in a lot of different directions. Play and find the presentation you envisioned when you took the image. I didn't straighten it a bit as it seemed he was walking downhill.

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Thank you very much for your contribution! I love the result !!! I remember that it was really a big surprise for me, looking first at the opposite, attracted by a geyser in activity an then turning back my head to see about fifty yards from me a quiet animal seeming to enjoy the hot spring; That morning, my only lens was a wide angle and I remained very cautious, staying at a good distance of such an impredictable animal. I took many shots but I think after reading the first comments and yours, that this one is the best, giving a ghostly aspect to the scene.
 
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Cool mood in this image.

FWIW, I like Karen's framing and positioning of the Bison the best out of this set. Some of the early edits up top bullseye the main subject and also have it looking out of the frame. The last two are both improvements in my opinion but I like the overall presentation Karen showed the best but maybe that's just me.

I'd also say it's a shame the Bison's head and fur on the head isn't sharper. I like silhouettes to be pretty crisp at the subject outlines. That's also one reason I prefer Karen's slightly looser crop as it doesn't draw as much attention to the soft fur outlines around the head and neck. (after another glance it might just be that Karen posted a smaller version of the same crop and framing used in the B&W version :) )

Just my 2 cents as there are many ways to see and work an image like this.
 
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Thank you very much for your appreciation and your comments! I understand what you mean and I will look at some others pics taken to see if the fur and the head would be sharper; to get a better separation with the background; also I ask myself if with the new masking tool of lightroom classic, it would be possible to improve the sharpness of the subject without touching to the background or to the sky; I am in learning mode with this tool and I will practice myself with it.
 
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Here is a new one with a cropping similar to the previous one; the subject is sharper (may be I was less intimidated :) ); it is especially the absence of fog in front of the buffalo.

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Cristobal,
This is a very low resolution black and white crop and edit I played around with from your original photo. I hope it is OK with you if I did this. I see someone else above did so I assumed it was OK. Let me know if it is not and I will remove this comment or at least edit the image out if it lets me.
Jeff S.
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jeffnles1 said:
Cristobal,
This is a very low resolution black and white crop and edit I played around with from your original photo. I hope it is OK with you if I did this. I see someone else above did so I assumed it was OK. Let me know if it is not and I will remove this comment or at least edit the image out if it lets me.
Jeff S.
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No no, it's ok! I like this kind of work in progress! Just a question: if I want to bring back your image in Lightroom for editing, how we do that?
 
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Cristobal said:
No no, it's ok! I like this kind of work in progress! Just a question: if I want to bring back your image in Lightroom for editing, how we do that?
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First I didn't download your original image just drug it to my desktop which produces a really low resolution (think like a screen capture). I'm on a Mac so just right click on the image and save to downloads.
I think Windows would have a similar functionality even if the wording is different.

Here is what I did using Affinity Photo 2 but same process would work in Light Room.
I converted to black and white.
I cropped a little and leveled the horizon
I then cloned out the trees on both sides
I backed off the saturation on yellows and reds (yes that impacts black and white too). This darkened the grass a little.
I then dodged the fog area to brighten it up some
I burned the grass area to make it darker.

I didn't add any sharpening or clarity or anything else to it.

Hope this helps.
 
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