Stunning Landscapes - made with a 5D

Carrigman

Have a look at this guy's work:

http://photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=554943

The best collection of images made with a 5D that I've seen.

And the camera has never been better value!

I know. I know. It's not the camera - it's the photographer. But the camera helps too..and the 5D, I suspect, helps more than most.

I can see myself contacting Albert one of these days.

nice1franko

thanks carrigman. you saved me wasting a whole lot of time on photography. i just got a 400d a few weeks ago but i'm going to throw it away and leave it to pro's like this marcus chap.

rymus

"jaaaaaysus"

elven

There's a whole lotta photoshop going on there... all the camera provides is more/better data to play with.

Of course, that doesn't mean I'm not drooling at the thought of a 5D for my very ownsome one day :rolleyes:

rymus

in that case, must learn photoshop

Carrigman

Have a look too at his website: http://wildphoto.smugmug.com/

He gives some details of his post processing technique.

elven

(easily accessible mountainous scenery and ridiculously favourable lighting conditions also help)

Morlar

I think one or two of them are outstanding shots - but most of them are ruined by ott processing. They remind me of airbrushed sci-fi pulp novel covers from a few years ago. They were in a certain 'unreal' kind of uniform style that these would fit right into imo.

Roen

Carrigman wrote:

Have a look too at his website: http://wildphoto.smugmug.com/

He gives some details of his post processing technique.

They actually looked very HDR to me, but I see some of his comments state that he doesn't use that technique. I must read up on his PP to see what he does.
Cheers.

kjt

Wow, some amazing shots there!

Glowing

They are amazing alright, however how much of that is due to skills in Photoshop as opposed to good photography? I'm pretty sure he's an exellent photographer but i'd love to see the originals too.....

FreeAnd..

Agree with Morlar and Roen on this one, lots of those look like HDR's and wouldnt be my cup of tea at all. Must be alot of PP to get them like that if they are not HDR's - anyone want to provide a synopsis? Sounds to me like you are just trying to justify getting a 5D, no need to go on this guys images just get one

mathias

Probably not HDR's in the true sense , ( by that i mean multiple exposures of the same scene merged and tone mapped ) , but you can get a similar looking result by using a single raw file and tone mapping , or using the curve tool in photoshop ,

As he said in the techniques part , its only about 10 minutes work if you are familiar with the tool.

Some of those shots do look like HDR's , no doubt about it , I like the effect a lot , but clearly not everyones cup of tea which is perfectly understandable as it can look a bit extreme.

By the way ,if anyone else has noticed , Practical photography concentrates on landscapes this month ( Again ! ) and a lot of the shots wouldnt look out of place in this guys collection.

Ive got a 5D and as with all raw shots , the basic file can look a bit flat , as the original does in the techniques section of this guys site , yes you should get as much as possible right in camera , but most of these shots definitely owe their look to the post processing , and that look can be done with an entry level dSLR , I would say its not particularly specific to the 5d or any other camera in that price range.

Damned Thing

From what I've seen he doesn't really do much in Photoshop.

My guess is he gets a good reading for the terrain and compensates for the sky with graduated ND filters - dodging back any obvious signs of using them. Using graduated ND filters is the old fashioned way of increasing dynamic range, pretty much the same result as using one RAW file to create a good exposure for the ground and a good exposure for the sky and brushing them together in PS. The only other things he needs do is some sharpening here and there and bump up the saturation in spots, which he can do in the RAW file or in PS.

With scenery like that you'd have to be blind not to take a good snap; though, personally, I think the saturation has been bumped up to the level of postcard tweeness and lost a lot of drama...the monotone ones work a lot better.

Valentia

I think they are fairly well cooked all the same. I'd find that kind of stuff boring after awhile. Almost too perfect. That could just be a touch of jealousy though.

I think the 5D bit is kind of irrelevant TBH. At these sizes any decent camera could have captured them. You'd need to see them as big prints to see the benefits of the 5D methinks.

I'm gone off landscapes a bit. After looking at some of the crap I took on Valentia I think I have realised how sh1te I am at them. Maybe getting up early would improve them?

magicbastarder

i'll throw my hat into the overprocessed camp; e.g.
http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=5958403

there what looks like an obvious gradient on the mountain just above the trees.

i do like this though:
http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=4337140

elven

It's been done to death, so unless you have the drive/patience/determination to wait for that light and do the filter thing and then follow up with the processing, it's just going to look like you're copying those. And if you do... you're just going to be copying those...!

It's driving me a bit nuts, that oversaturated sort of overdramatic thing, it's all over that screening site, and all the calendars in the shops and all the magazines, and it seems to be what everyone is aiming for. Is there another kind of landscape that has a bit more to it, than just the initial 'wooo, pretty' factor?

I know there was the same sort of backlash when fuji brought out velvia at first. And I love velvia. But are we going too far now?

Fajitas!

I'm after sending off some letters to various magazines about their reliance on boring, over processed HDR'd coastal shots for every second front page and article.

Have high doubts to any of them being published

Driving me fcuking nuts, so it is.

magicbastarder

we should have a 'post your best landscape' thread, so people can see how much we practice what we preach.
one of my favourites of my own is a water-washing-over-rocks seascape...

311

The picture in the set that caught my eye was "The tree god". I think it was more the definition than anything else.

The colours in the set are the usual ,wow ,great shots ,hdr ,pass the blunt .

Valentia

magicbastarder wrote:

one of my favourites of my own is a water-washing-over-rocks seascape...

Now that's something we don't see much of not!

I like a certain amount of slow watery flowingee stuff but again it is ubiquitous in the extreme. Again I wouldn't mind taking a few of my own. If only I could compose them so that I would be happy with them. Jazus I am in a negative frame this evening!! WTF?

magicbastarder

i may as well post what i got that evening - 2 hours of freezing my knackers off on a beach in cork in mid february. thoroughly enjoyed it.

http://www.stroma.org/galeria/thumbnails.php?album=9&page=2

magicbastarder

actually, just looking at the main page of photo.net, this is the photo of the week from last week, and it's just gorgeous:
http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=4838859

mike65

Ansel Adams for the Tartan Biscuit Box classes.

Mike.

elven

Ooh magic, I love that boat bow. Worth freezing bits off for

Fajitas!

magicbastarder wrote:

we should have a 'post your best landscape' thread, so people can see how much we practice what we preach.
one of my favourites of my own is a water-washing-over-rocks seascape...

Did it have a purple sky? With the rocks at the centre of the composition, reaching out towards the centre of the frame, and an exposure length of about 2 mins for the waves?

magicbastarder

mike65 wrote:

Ansel Adams for the Tartan Biscuit Box classes.

Mike.

i don't get the reference?

elven, that boat bow was taken earlier that day, my bits were mercifully intact at the time.

Valentia

magicbastarder wrote:

actually, just looking at the main page of photo.net, this is the photo of the week from last week, and it's just gorgeous:
http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=4838859

It is indeed .

sineadw

I have to say the tree god caught me too, but in the small size. Julie and I have talked about this and I'm sure its been covered here - sooo many shots on flickr et al that look bloody fabulous in thumbnail. Are we missing out? Or is that another thread altogether? Or is it just the codeine talking?

Danny your landscape shots are feckin fantastic! I left a comment on one in particular - clouds over an island in Kerry. That one blew me away.

I personally have no skill with those type of shots. I look with my eye and the chorus of angels is in my head and I take the shot and when I get home its just meh. Even after heavy processing, which i'm leaning towards these days. I don't know how to portray that wonder. So I'd be the last to criticise, even if its been done lots it still looks bloody great!

Ah I just want the 10-20

311

A 5D must be great , A great picture is priceless

Valentia

sineadw wrote:

I don't know how to portray that wonder.

That's it exactly. Soooooooooooooo frustrating. I wont let it stop me enjoying that wonder all the same.

JMcL

Absolutely stunning set of images

elven wrote:

There's a whole lotta photoshop going on there... all the camera provides is more/better data to play with.

If the image he's showing in his starting image on the website is typical, he's starting from a pretty good base! Also, no amount of Photoshopping is going to get him into the middle of the wilderness/on top of a mountain for dawn .

FreeAnd.. wrote:

Agree with Morlar and Roen on this one, lots of those look like HDR's and wouldnt be my cup of tea at all. Must be alot of PP to get them like that if they are not HDR's - anyone want to provide a synopsis?

They don't necessarily have to be HDRs. Just look at any of Joe Cornish's images and see what can be done with just a 5x4 view camera and a well stocked kitbag of Lee filters. I posted a thread here a while back in the digital darkroom about how I go about it (not strictly HDR, my experiments with Photomatix and the like have always proved unsatisfactory)

digitalage

This guy Marc is a excellent photographer, he used shoot alot of his work with fuji velvia and use ND grads and alot of his early work was'nt photoshoped, most of what you see was out of the camera, he was an active member on photosig were you can see alot of his work.

http://www.photosig.com/go/users/userphotos?id=213645

Merrion

I have a 5D and have never taken anything like the photos in the original post so I can assure you that the skill of the photographer is a major part of the results :-)

philstar

in laymans english in a nutshell whats....5D??

in laymans english in a nutshell whats....HDR??

sineadw

philstar wrote:

in laymans english in a nutshell whats....5D??

in laymans english in a nutshell whats....HDR??

a 5D is a canon DSLR camera, and a lovely one it is too...

HDR= High Dynamic Range - wiki article

Carrigman

philstar wrote:

in laymans english in a nutshell whats....5D??

in laymans english in a nutshell whats....HDR??

A Canon 5D digital SLR Camera. See www.dpreview.com et al for information.

HDR (High Dynamic Range) is a photographic technique. See http://tutorialblog.org/hdr-tutorials-roundup/

philstar

so HDR is basically a filtering effect........but where's the skill in that??

any jackass can apply an effect:cool:

Valentia

philstar wrote:

so HDR is basically a filtering effect........but where's the skill in that??

any jackass can apply an effect:cool:

Oh dear! I hate the effect but any jackass can't do it and fewer still can do it well.

Oriel

All those photos are good for 4 simple reasons:

• Location
• Weather
• Timing (early morning, long exposure)
• Photoshop

The fact that it was a 5D means pish-all to the photos.
And those are some heavily photoshoped images...