Thanks Eskimo-man. Not a problem for me but I know it is for others. Once made this mistake on SFN and BOOM!!! but you always have OK to re-post on SFN...:-))
now I must learn GIMP or PS.
The real lesson is making the background less prevalent and the statute more prevalent. I don't see this stuff but now I do... good to have people with talent making suggestions and positive comments. Thanks Ian and fur-head-man :-))
I like that one. I also played around with it on PD Elements 10 but I wouldn't dare post the mods without sending you it via mail first. Sorry Ian.
I know what you mean. The learning curve can be steep.
With GIMP the secret for me was learning about layers. You can duplicate the existing photo as a layer and then play with that, allowing you to superimpose changes and switch them on and off easily by making the layer visible or not.
The next thing is learning how to select effectively so that you can select an object - the statue in this case - then invert the selection (Select -> Invert) to have the background selected. Then use Edit -> Paste as -> New Layer and this creates a layer that you can manipulate (for example using Colors -> Hue-Saturation), again superimposed on the original image and visible or not. In that way you can play without having to reload, lose changes etc.
Lastly save the GIMP file with a file type .xcf. That saves all the layer information allowing you to go back to where you left off.
I'm still very much a beginner in GIMP, but I do like playing with it from time to time.
Thanks, Ian. I enjoy the posts with actual pictures changed. Hard for me to just visualize comments sometimes. I've tried GIMP and PS... just don't know how to use them effectively and eventually lose interest. Anyway, thanks for your comments.
Here's yours with the background desaturated by 70%.
Another, with slightly less desaturation:
You can play with these tools for hours to get the effect you want, it's the equivalent of losing yourself in the darkroom for hours on end.
There must be many ways to do it, but I have used the editing software "The GIMP" in the past to select the parts of the photo that I wanted to desaturate and reduced them effectively to B+W. Done well it can be a very interesting effect.
I see your point, Stuart, and added another shot with less sharpness in background. I was shooting at ISO100, f/1.8 and 1/60sec with my new Nikkor 35mm f/1.8G lens. RAW photo (22MB). Maybe need to open aperture next time. I focused on her face very carefully using tripod because sun was setting behind me and getting dark. I don't know how to reduce saturation in background, Eskimo-man :-))
Hi Neil
My idea was to take it quite a way down to help the statue stand out. But I guess if the background was out of focus this wouldn't be necessary.
I couldn't comment on the colour or saturation of any image I see on my monitor. The colour space will be different from Mike's and from yours - mine is set to sRGB IEC6 and to replicate as closely as possible on screen, HP Indigo Press as this is what I print out too from Photoshop.
A little bit less depth of field Mike and reduce the saturation in the background. Otherwise I like it.
Knickers!
That's cold.
Very nice MIke, thumbs up!
