What would you do with this photo? (Elise @ Ironbridge)

[Stuart Wright]

I was driving through Ironbridge the other evening and it struck me that my car set in front of the iron bridge itself would make a nice photo.
So I parked, crossed the road, whipped out my iPhone and took this picture.
Of course it's not very good quality so I started having a play with some of the effects available to me in my imaging software and I started to wonder what other people would do with this to improve it or make it a bit artistic.
What would you do to improve this photo (aside from go back and take it again with a proper camera)?

 

[weetsie]

give it a sky.

 

[PKW]

i was experiment with the contrast, you have a very nice car by the way

 

[Some Bloke]

I'd send the photo to the Police and report the driver for parking on a double Yellow Line

 

[gpa]

 

[Gordon @ Convergent AV]

To me the image is all about contrast...an old marvel of the industrial era juxtaposed with a modern vehicular masterpiece. So if it were my image I would want to try to help show the difference. To that mind I'd be inclined to process it to make it look like a late 1800's photo but with this modern car in the shot.....

 

[RobDickinson]

I'd crop it so the loti sits on the left/bottom 3rd lines.

I'd fix the wb and up the exposure of the lower half and add contrast.

Then add some sky.

 

[shotokan101]

Think the first thing I'd do would be to drop down to a lower shooting position.....

...then I'd convert to mono - maybe a sepia with some desaturation - then add some grain effect.....

Jim

 

[TonyH]

clone out the bin, the bollards, the concrete and metal fence, the sign on the wall, and the manhole

 

[senu]

clone out the bin, the bollards, the concrete and metal fence, the sign on the wall, and the manhole

Not a lot then?

I agree the photo has a lot of potential although limited by starting quality and from the above comments can be " enhanced" in a few different ways

Stu, Do you mind if folk " have a go"?

PS: Nice ride...

 

[Stuart Wright]

Thanks, everyone for the replies.
@gpa - nice work

To me the image is all about contrast...an old marvel of the industrial era juxtaposed with a modern vehicular masterpiece.

Yeah, that was my idea at the time.

Stu, Do you mind if folk " have a go"?

PS: Nice ride...

I would love people to have a go at improving/adding artistic effects. I struggled to know what to do with it myself.
I wonder how much better image I would have got with an iPhone 4

Re the car - yeah I'm lucky. Saved up for a decade.

 

[OrbitalPete]

Well here's a quick 5 minute job. There's not a huge amount more you can do without applying effects filters which - personally - I thoroughly dislike

Increased exposure a little, ran some noise reduction, added blue tones to the sky, cloned out some of the clutter and cropped it to try and empahsize the subjects a bit more.

 

[SevloW]

I'm not that good with pp skills but I had a go and here are 3 different versions.

 

[Gordon @ Convergent AV]

Thanks, everyone for the replies.
@gpa - nice work
Yeah, that was my idea at the time.

I would love people to have a go at improving/adding artistic effects. I struggled to know what to do with it myself.
I wonder how much better image I would have got with an iPhone 4

Re the car - yeah I'm lucky. Saved up for a decade.

Not sure it would have been much better with iPhone 4 Stuart...Just be able to print it out larger. I use my iPhone 3Gs almost exclusively. You can do pretty special stuff with it...I'll have a go at your shot later...


Sevelo: That middle one with the desaturated diffuse glow look is pretty coolio

 

[Member 79251]

How about this ?

 

[shotokan101]

I like that

Jim

 

[Johnnypanic]

pixelpixel, that is fantastic

 

[mike.y]

pixelpixel very impressive i wonder if you could tell us beginners how you did it
Michael

 

[twist]

 

[Stuart Wright]

Hey these are impressive. Fun, too. I wonder if there is any scope for a photo re-touching competition to run alongside the current competition?

 

[shotokan101]

RAOTFLMAO

Classic

...is it a good likeness Stuart ?

Jim

 

[Member 79251]

pixelpixel very impressive i wonder if you could tell us beginners how you did it
Michael

It was all a bit random.

I made a copy of the image and then copied it.
Next I converted it to black and white.
Next I created a mask for the sky.
I did this the cheap and quick way. I inverted the black and white image and that gave me my sky mask.
I used one of my cloud images and that the sky was back.

Next I fixed the lighting on the car.

Now I blurred the back ground and did a mask on it. I masked the car and also the bridge.

Added another mask to add the colour.

Job done .

 

[shotokan101]

Thanks for the Mini-Tutorial

Note to Self: ...really need to get to grips with Masks/Layers....

Jim

 

[Member 79251]

Thanks for the Mini-Tutorial

Note to Self: ...really need to get to grips with Masks/Layers....

Jim

A mask is what it is. You don't see the mask bit. Just like when you wear a mask you don't see the face. I always get which way it goes mixed up but you can always flip it. It can only be white or black.

A layer is just that. When I first used Photoshop it had no layers You just build on the image that you are using. You can switch on or off a layer at any one time and you can blend layers into each other.

Try to do this they are fun

 

[shotokan101]

Thanks for that - will have a go

Jim