Crappy light, thanks to cloud cover... Here's the original shot, nothin more than a roster shot: And the artsy-fartsy shot, thaks to light filtering thru the clouds: \ Which is better, and why? I like the darker one, even with crappy exposure.
The sun "ray" effect adds a mood to the darker shot. Both views are plenty good. But the latter is much more memorable. Boxcab E50
The second photo....that ray of sunshine is only highlighting the loco, nothing else. Does that mean the Lord is a UP fan?
The alien tractor beams have latched onto the soon to be aquired 1:1 scale model for the layout on a planet near aldebaran23.
I like that thought. I have always felt that our solar system is merely an atom, and the Milky Way a molecule of some far larger system. Therefore, UP 5540 is about to become a pre-weathered Z-Scale locomotive in some kid's bedroom layout......
In Cheyenne, I see Rocky plastered on chip gons on a frequent basis... Hytec, that's rich! I nearly fell off my chair laughing!
I must be a Philistine when it comes to artistic shots, but I woulda hit the "delete" button on my camera. But that's just me. Besides, we all know in Heaven, the locomotives are all painted in Mandarin orange & white...........
What about Aspen Gold and silver? Or Omaha Orange and Pullman Green? Thanks, Alan. I certainly didn't think much would have come of the shot....
The second version is the keeper. The only other thing I woud do would be to very slightly lighten the locomotive so that we see some hint of detail. Not a lot, but just enough that the viewer easily recognizes what that big object is. Your rendition is excellent. Artsy, but not fartsy.
I can lighten or darken a whole image, but don't know how to do this to just a part of an image. I suppose it depends on the software? (I use Paint Shop Pro 7).
Well, part II: Thanks for the responses! The light at Harriman, WY was very unusable, (best light is late afternoon to evening, and winter light) so I shot what I could, and I'lll let you decide which is better: Choice A: Choice B:
Alan- It can be done in PSP7. Use the select tool to "outline" the loco. Then you can apply the brightness and contrast tool, set for only a small change. When you have the image the way you want, turn off the selection. You may have to go through some trial and error, but the PSP undo works very well. I used to use PSP7. I am now using version 9. Here is a non-railroad sample. I first selected only the sky, which in the original, was only tones of grey. I added a small hint of blue. Next I inverted the selection so that all but the sky was selected. Now I applied the brightness and contrast tool, and the unsharp mask tool to bring out the details in the building. Total time to do all that was about 15 minutes.
Hemi, I like the second shot better because is shows more detail. However, the first shot has some potential, with a little work. I would first crop away some of the foreground and some of the sky, but not take anything away from the sides. This will give you a wide, panarama-like view. Next I would lighten and sharpen it a bit. The wide format with the reduction of the picture height empnasizes the train's length and focuses the viewer's attention there.
