Thank you all, I really appreciate your comments. I feel very honoured, particularly to get two observations from you Dierk. I really am grateful. Thank you.
Steve, sorry for the long delay in replying to your question. Yes happy to share. For this photograph I shot in RAW, processed in Capture One, exported to Photoshop CS5 and then ColSFX. There I use Tonal Contrast set to (in descending order) +30+30+30+10. I then go back into CS5 and use the History Brush to get rid of any unwanted artefacts from processing and then I export to Siver EFX2 and in the standard mode adjust Brightness to -10, Contrast to +10 and Structure to +35. I then Flatten and if necessary sharpen (normally not) to +75 and that's it! I hope that makes sense! :-)
For me this image is so impressive, as the skin tone of the body is so close to the tone of the wood, but the wood is so much rougher than the skin. This contrast and the only light gray of his trousers and the composition of the lines and patterns make a really fascinating image!
And he looks at me and includes the viewer into the scene.
Totally agree with Sol - thought I preferred the color at first, but for sheer dramatic impact, the BW really works. For whatever reason, the color image is a bit more intimate (?), I'm not sure what words to use.
Steve, sorry for the long delay in replying to your question. Yes happy to share. For this photograph I shot in RAW, processed in Capture One, exported to Photoshop CS5 and then ColSFX. There I use Tonal Contrast set to (in descending order) +30+30+30+10. I then go back into CS5 and use the History Brush to get rid of any unwanted artefacts from processing and then I export to Siver EFX2 and in the standard mode adjust Brightness to -10, Contrast to +10 and Structure to +35. I then Flatten and if necessary sharpen (normally not) to +75 and that's it! I hope that makes sense! :-)
And he looks at me and includes the viewer into the scene.
congratulations, Jeremy