vmloping

[armando_m]

An experiment, lots to criticize, but here it goes

"Clean your room"


wanted to try vmlopes workflow :
1. My Workflow Part 1
2. My Workflow Part 2
3. Light Rays My Way

really did wonders

9 exposures +-3ev range, used 5 to create the HDR

Photomatix 4.0
strength 84
saturation 68
smoothing 10
temperature -2.3
highlight saturation 4
shade saturation -4.5
saved as tiff 16 bit Adobe RGB

Capture nx2
added contrast
resized
sharpen
saved as jpg in sRGB

GIMP
to add the light rays with layers and motion blur zoom

the windows looks funny for - I think - the following reasons
maybe some camera movement
needed even darker exposures
shade on the curtain of the window frame bars and the actual bars are too close

Now I need to find a worthy subject for this technique

[ksbryan0]

Pretty darn cool! If you could diffuse the blown out sun, it would be perfect. And if you think that room needs to be cleaned, don't look at mine!

[n8]

Yeah, that room looks quite tidy.
The light rays are a bit too strong, and the asymmetrical placement in the window bothers me. The actual hdr looks good...no grunge at all...in fact the only thing "lopey" about this is the light rays. I do think the brightness could have been brought up in the room though.
Cool tiles.

[draymorton]

Very nice job!

There is something odd about the window, but not sure what yet. The strength of the rays is a little high, just a little. There is a halo around the chair. But all of the above are just nitpicks. Really well done overall.

[OldClicker]

I like the treatment, but the light rays... For them to fan out like that, the source would have to be just outside the window. If it's the sun, they will all be going the same direction as a single point source. - Terry

[armando_m]

Quick and easy experiment gets positive feedback , i like the current mood of the critique section

- To tone down the sun I beleive i'll need more exposures darker, i would need to reshoot, I'm not skilledd enough to try to lower such intense highlight in PP and make it look good
- The non symetrical light rays have the focal point at the sun , and yes they look not centered, i agree they may look better centered in the window
- About making the room brighter , I intentionally left the brightest exposures about 1.5 EV out of the hdr to get a darker image, and i like how the shades turned out on the floor
- The the bit of halo around the chair is probably oversharpening after resizing
- Rays intensity ... you should have seen the original ,looked like a nuclear explosion , the layer screen is at 10% and can easily go lower

Here is a re-edit
more light in the room, darken the window a bit, changed the direction of the rays

[n8]

+1 for the improvement on the room, -1 for the change of the light rays. As I looked at the original a bit more and thought about my first post, I realized that I didn't want the rays right in the middle, but for them to appear to originate from the brightest point, which is a tad left of where you had them. In this edit, I can see a hint of them coming from where they should, but the prominent ones still seem too strong/sharp, and don't seem to be natural in their origin.

[Asmarlak]

Very nice to start with but the rays are so neat and too clear. I'd reduce their strength, blur them, and blend them half way with the rest of the image. The left side of the image is leaning to left which make the whole image look distorted and uncomfortable to the eye, it should lean to the right.

[armando_m]

As always when trying new things, I resist to make the effect to subtle , I realize that for the rays to be so visible it would mean there is a construction going on in the middle of the room producing lots of dust, but probably in a different dimension as it doesn't show in the image

ok kidding aside

when adding the rays I went and applied a heavy unsharp mask to make them really pop, I guess they do, but a little to much

Thanks for your comments!!

[OldClicker]

+1 for the improvement on the room, -1 for the change of the light rays. As I looked at the original a bit more and thought about my first post, I realized that I didn't want the rays right in the middle, but for them to appear to originate from the brightest point, which is a tad left of where you had them. In this edit, I can see a hint of them coming from where they should, but the prominent ones still seem too strong/sharp, and don't seem to be natural in their origin.

And the rays may be a touch off in their direction - should be the same as the shadows. Great exercise! - Terry

[Asmarlak]

When the rays are met with an object, they should break down, they should break down at the bed.

[GB1]

They don't look completely realistic but I think it's a success anyway because this is the first time you've going VMLoping .. This shot almost looks religious - idea for Easter ?

G

[vmlopes]

Hahaha..............too clean for me,,,,,,,,,,,,not derelict enough................lol

Not sure what is going on with the window still looks like there is some movement, maybe the shadow on the nets??

Quick tip, on your -3 image drag it over the top of you HDR as a new layer, then create a layer mask, and paint out everything but the window.

This may help with the ghosting and blown area............

[armando_m]

good thing it doesn't look derelict, it's my daughters room

Thanks for the tip about the -3EV mask layer, altough in this case what looks like ghosting are the shadows on the curtain, here is a crop showing the window in the darkest exposure

[GB1]

Seeing this glowing effect made me think of an effect I had once seen. Check out the link below, the first pic seems to have a similar glowing window area.

www.davehillphoto.com

[LeeIs]

The 2nd one is real good! vert whimsical and dreamy.