What!? I thought this comp closed later today! I didn't get chance to add an entry! ... anywho, well done to iceblinker, if you need me to host the file again, just let me know.

You can pick up a 640gb Hitachi drive for a mere £40.19 these days. The price of storage has dropped so much in the last few years, I remember paying over £100 for 60gb not so long ago!

I feel that b&w works very well with flowers, more so with closed buds and smaller flowers, unless the colours are very vibrant or the flower is going to more or less fill the frame - then b&w is a very good way to get a nice shot out of an otherwise throw away image.

At the end of the day, every shot is different and not everyone is going to like the way you process them!

I personally prefer the originally posted b&w and think its a very good shot, although it is interesting to see the original colour ;o)




edit: typo

Its a very capable lens, Its on my camera 85% of the time! Take a look at my - flickr photostream for the 17-70mm

The only bad point I have for it is that I wish it was weather sealed like the Pentax 16-50, It also has a 72mm filter thread, so filters tend to be a little more expensive that kitlens filters - the macro feature is also nothing to shout about, its more 'super close focus' than macro.

Multiple layers also require more memory to process, for photoshop work, 1gb of RAM hasn't cut it for several years!!!

Personally, I'd rather have the flexibility of 16bit while editing than have to be careful having to use additional uneeded layers...

When working with 8bit images, we are referring to 8bits per channel, so you have 256 shades of each red/blue/green colour - mixing these varying shades gives you a palette of 16,777,216 possible colours.

So, when working with 16bit images we have 65,536 shades of each red/blue/green colour giving a staggering 281 trillion possible colours - the human eye cant see the difference between an 8bit and a 16bit image.

However, when doing alot of editing on the image in photoshop, the image can become degraded - the most common is banding, where colour transitions become stepped.

Its always better to work in 16bit for as long as you can, once your happy with the image or need to use an 8bit filter, then change - your images will suffer alot less artifacting and banding working this way.

Ok, I've got the raw for challenge 3 and its been uploaded to my webserver.

Bob - I'm sending you a PM with the link to the file so you can start the new competition.. are you going to start it in the Gallery>Competitions section as suggested by John?

Brian.

Could you try and upload direct to my web server Bob?

link to upload page

Just spent 10 mins creating an upload script, will only accept .PEF or .DNG files under 35mb.

edit.. this may not work! lol - if you have ftp access I can give you access to the pentaxuser folder if that would be easier?

Brian.

Looks a good idea John... is there a facility to upload the RAW file for adjustment in the competitions section? or will we still need to house the RAW externally?


p.s. I don't mind holding the RAW file for the competitions, but I will be removing them as the competitions close due to their file size and the fact I use the space for other projects!

Brian.

Ok, I didn't expect such a high number of entries (16 in total) - and I'm not the best at this judging business, I have thumbnailed each shot and tried to give constructive feedback as best I can.


- Kemp - Well processed colour and tone and a different crop, good work pulling the detail in the cranes and building in the distance while not over-sharpening the foreground.


- Mike-P - Interesting choice of crop although the tree in the bottom right pulls the eye away from the cranes which appear to be the main choice of focal point, details retained well and colours look very natural.


- Steve O - Nicely processed tones and shadows, putting the awkward tree in towards the centre of the frame makes it a less noticeable distraction.


- Mannesty - Very naturally edited, haze is still present in the distance keeping the depth in the shot, the layered clouds have been enhanced well without making them look unnatural.


- Sanderscapes - Again very naturally edited, the clouds are not quite as prominent as they could be, but the colours have been kept very natural.


- RR - Nice and tight crop on the main focal point of the shot, the mono conversion and increased contrast adds tone and character. A real think outside the box attempt at the challenge.


- Tony-O - Slightly oversaturated making all the colours pop out almost making a dreary day look decent!


- Prieni - Almost looks HDR or heavily tone mapped, some of the details have lost some definition in the processing, but the colours are well balanced.


- MGraley - A very interesting idea turning this into a postcard style shot, the sepia tone adds warmth and an aged look to the shot.


- Dogpaws - Very heavily processed, looks to have added artificial film grain added - shot has character and a individual approach to the challenge.


- CraigF1969 - Well cropped, details in the layered clouds are well retained and the eye is drawn into the cranes in the distance.


- malo1961 - Nice crop and black and white conversion. Taking out the roof tops and trees distracting from the skyline.


- iceblinker - Nice, almost square crop showing the depth of the shot well. Tones and colours brought out well.


- epithet man - Extremely tight crop, not as much detail brought out due to the crop. Black and White done well.


- piotro - Natural edit with good control of shadows and highlights while retaining the depth to the shot.


- Anvh - Well executed idea on the shot, the sunset/sunrise effect works well and completely changes the mood.


And the results -

3rd Place - CraigF1969 - really liked the colours brought out in this version and the crop takes out the awkward positioned trees.

2nd Place - Anvh - great idea making this into a sunrise/sunset shot and was very close between this and RR's edit.

1st Place - RR - as soon as I saw this I thought it would be a hard one to follow, the crop is great and the processing really makes the image pop, great work.

This was extremely hard to choose a winner, all the edits were well executed - hopefully the feed back will be helpful and that everyone has enjoyed participating.

So I guess its over to RR to upload the next shot for RAW Challenge #3 (if you dont have anywhere to store the RAW file, send it on to me and I'll post it on my webserver where this one was held).

Brian.