2 Pictures from Tara today

Borderfox

Here's 2 I took at the hill of Tara today. I took them as RAW and did a few adjustments after, also tried a few different exposures. C&C welcome

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y213/Borderfox/IMG_66862904.jpg
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y213/Borderfox/IMG_66152904.jpg

Personally I like the second one but thats just me...:)

Fajitas!

Both are nice shots, the first could do with a crop along the bottom though, and a play around with the levels. The second is nicely composed. I like the way the sun is setting almost above the stone! Again, a nice play about with levels should have them looking better!

Borderfox

Thanks Fajitas, just getting the hang of raw...

Fajitas!

No problemo, hope you don't mind the advice.

Borderfox

No really welcome, I opened it in PS and seen lots of sliders and just slid lots of them!!

Fajitas!

Lol, what you need is the contrast/brightness sliders first! Best thing to do is just what you said! Slide them up and down until your happy!

Borderfox

Good advice thanks Fajitas

EireRoadUser

I really like the light on the second one ,the stones around the bottom catch the light very sureally.
Cool spot you've got yourself there

Borderfox

The place itself is really nice I would reccomend a visit for dawn or sunset. I must get up early and go up. It's only 10 minutes drive from me in Dunshaughlin.

CrowdedHouse

Nice ...they bring to mind a poem I learned in National school(many decades ago !) of which I can only remember the opening line

On Tara's hill the daytlight dies,
On Tara's plain 'tis dead....

Flipflip

The only problem Id have is that they're a bit "flat" if you get me.

But as was said, a quick play with levels will sort that out and im sure theyll look alot better!

Keep it up man!

Valentia

Lovely shots. I have to disagree with Fajitas! about adjusting the brightness though. I would never touch it on a jpeg. Adjusting exposure in RAW is different.

Open "levels" in PS. Adjust the two sliders on the left and right so that that they are just at the beginning and end of the histogram. Use that as the starting point and adjust to your taste. Use the middle slider to change the gamma. The exposure control is better than brightness in PS but it only needs tiny movement to make a big difference.

Scott Kelby's book Photoshop CS2 for Photographers is the best book I've come across for getting into PS. It has short, to the point, chapters with brilliant simple technoques for all the stuff we talk about here.

joolsveer

I like the first one more than the second. I was in Tara recently and also took some shots of the Stone of Destiny but these are far better. It must have been fairly late in the evening when you were there. Is it accessible at all hours?

Borderfox

Yeah joolsveer we left just after 9 last night. Thanks for the advice Valentia, they were taken in raw. Thanks for all the comments really helpful...:)

Carrigman

I did a quick adjustment to one of them as attached. It's not necessarily any better, just different.

Borderfox

Thats good Carrigman what did you do? brighten it?

Carrigman

In Photoshop I selected the bottom portion of the photo using the Lasso tool. I then brightened the selection using Levels - this left the top portion untouched. I then selected the Inverse selection and tweaked the sky a little bit, again using Levels. I increased the saturation of the overall photgraph a small bit and then I resized it and added a border using the Canvas Size option. Finally I used Unsharp Mask to sharpen it a tad. All pretty basic stuff.

Borderfox

Thats more work in PS than I would do in a week, I usually just crop them or do some raw changes!