In difficult landscape lighting situations, I formerly was temped to shoot HDR, and the controls on the S2 allowed me to do that easily. But I have found that the highlight and shadow sliders on Lightroom are a better way to go.
In this example, I am trying to be able to bring up out of the shadows the trees on the right side of the photo that are in shade, but also show the clouds in contrast to the bright sky.
Thanks to the range in the file, this is possible without HDR. The attached screenshot shows the before and after in LR.
For the exposure, I adjusted to allow the highlight warning to appear on the whitest part of the clouds, and the shadow warning to be minimal on the right side trees, and hope from experience that I had still more range.
A graduated ND filter would not have made this complicated shot any easier. Patience could have made this shot easier. Nature could have balanced the fight side out, had I waited for a cloud to cover the foreground in even shadow. Unfortunately, when it finally did, the nice clouds in the background had gone.
JackSpeaking of patience as a photographic tool, along with LR,
When I had finished posting the above photos, I returned to the scene and the clouds had realigned. A cloud acting as a diffuser on the foreground would smooth out the left and right set of trees using nature. So I retook the shot, this time with the foreground in the shade, which to keep the background from washing out meant I would have a pretty dark, but more evenly lit foreground. There was much less retouching required. You tell me which you like better. By the way, getting the color correct between the two shots was not something I yet tried to work on. If I ever print this shot, I may do further adjustment. I like both sets of color, but there is a difference. The blue of the sky had shifted with the angle of the sun, so all the colors had changed. I used the walkway as a color sample. Here is when you are glad to have RAW files to color adjust.
In case you were wondering, I am now in Wisconsin, not Arizona.
JackHi Jack, thanks for sharing. I like the way the sunlight brings to life the trees in the foreground in version one. OTOH I prefer the shadowless pathway in the second version and I can see how this is very important for the composition, because it directs the eye to the background without any shadows sort of blocking the view into the distance. YMMV, of course.
Cheers,
Peter
Thank you for sharing!
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