Leica M9, 50mm F/2, f/4, 1/60, iso 250
While in Trinidad, Cuba, several of us made friends with a wonderful proprietress of a Casa Particulare (Cuba's version of a B&B). She was gracious enough to let us photograph her beautiful property and we got some great images. Many were simple in nature, like this one.
I selected this one for today's Topaz Tuesday for a "particular" reason. With Topaz Adjust, I mostly try not to "over do" the effects it is capable of. I don't want to render a scene too crazy or untrue. But looking at the original of this still life, I felt I had license to do whatever I want. There aren't any people or other recognizable elements that would mean I had to use restraint.
So let's play!
Into Adjust 5 we go. I tried several presets, deciding I wanted this afternoon light effect. I settled on Grunge II. Grunge II has a vignette built in, and I backed that out by 50%. The hat was not defined enough for me, so I used the local effects burn tool (hey, just like the darkroom!) to darken it up a bit and make it more defined.
Working on the image I noticed that the bottom bar was a bit off vertical, but I decided I liked that just fine. This scene can stand a bit of quikiness.
As always, the original is on the continue link below. The Topaz Labs people have done a great job with this software. It's pretty much the only third party image tool I use. Everything else I want to do, I can do in Lightroom.
SOOC Image
