Hale House Re-visited
Nikon D7000 18-135mm @ 20mm ISO 200 3-bkts f/16 Lr3, HEP1, TpzSim; PsCS5
I think it is never too late to go back and revisit images that have been previously captured and processed and bring a new perspective to the images based upon the passage of time and my own growth as an artist. I was happy with my last rendering of the Hale House image last July because I had achieved a personal milestone in processing tools and techniques in the rendering of that HDR image as described in that blog posting. Since that time I have been exploring more and more with tools and techniques that result in my images rendering in a decided painterly style.
In the case of this image, I did turn down the Clarity slider in Lightroom and brought up the Vibrance slider, and after sharpening and noise reduction then moved the image in to Photoshop and used Topaz Simplify to remove detail and soften textures, and add some definition to edges; then copied that layer and applied Simplify again. I applied final touches back in Lightroom. My goal in applying the painterly effects and amping up the color saturation and brightness is to defeat any perception of this being a documentary photograph and to allow the viewer’s mind to fill in any blanks in terms of the story this image might tell or feelings it might evoke.
