It has been a ridiculously long time since I posted!
Thought I’d jump back in with a photo I played with and the steps I took to get there.
This all started when I was looking at Photoshop tutorials available on www.wikihow.com. I found one that demonstrated how to polarize an image in Photoshop here. I have to admit, the last couple of years there have been many times I wish I had my circular polarizer in my bag – and yet it was back at the office. So, I figured I’d give it a go.
After I played with the test image there, I decided to give it a go with one of my own images. The one I selected isn’t anything to write home about. However, it was an interesting place – I took a few photos with the intent to go back at another time and do it justice.
ISO 400, f/13, 1/15th second, 50mm – Nikon D300
I won’t repeat all the steps, as you can read about them in the Wikihow article, but here is the same photo after the polarizing tutorial. I can see where I might use this in some situations.
If you are like me, on occasion you might start messing around with Photoshop, just to see what happens. In this case, I had an interesting surprise that ties it back to the title of this post and the book called “The Road” by Cormac McCarthy. (NY Times Review)
A theme from the book that always pops into my head is how the world is pretty much covered in dust and is very dark.
Well, when I changed the last step in the polarizing tutorial (where it says to change the blend mode to “Overlay”) I decided to go with “Difference”. With the result, I was transported directly into that bleak world of McCarthy’s – dark, foreboding and covered in dust. It is kind of a creepy feel. I’ve got no clue if this is what the author had in mind, but this sure worked for me.
I think most of my photos try to show the world and nature in its most beautiful light. So, this is a bit of a departure for me! I’m not sure if anyone else would like it, but it was fun for me to do.
