This is a shot of the Lajitas Cemetery in Lajitas Texas taken in June of last year. Lajitas is located between Big Bend State and Big Bend National Parks in far West Texas. It was interesting to see these old graves covered with piles of loose stone. I’m sure it’s hard work digging in this mostly stone country and the rocks on top are probably a practical maneuver to avoid as much digging as possible. I thought this shot of through the entry gate created a pretty good sense of the mood of the place.
Tech: Oly E-3, 12-60 Zuiko @ 19mm, f3.5, 1/5000 & ISO 1250, Aperture Priority Post Processing: Duplicate Background>Crop Square>Topaz Adjust “Simplify”>Levels>Curves>Merge Visible in Multiply W/ Mask to Preserve Sky and Lighten Center of Shot>Selective Color Sky to Darken>Lens Distortion Vignette
4 comments:
Cool shot!
This has a cenematic feel to it for me, like it is a still taken from an old western movie.
Nice choice to go with the black and white treatment.
Cheers!
Barry
I like this shot a lot too. The composition is very interesting the way the arch frames the mountain and then goes around the whole image and my eye goes to the crosses in the various spots. I wish you had left a little more room around the cross at the top, but that could be added in Photoshop. Also, the tones are very similar across the image between the hills, the foreground and the stone pillars and I wonder if you could try moving the color sliders in the Black and White adjustment layer to get more separation, which might add more depth...I don't know if anything would change, but it is something to try.
Good shot!
Cindi
After reading Barry's comments, I recognized this cemetery. It is straight from the movie classic: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly.
This is one of those scenes that I would shoot 10 to 20 different ones to try to get the "one" I really liked.
Good job on the composition and the overall processing.
Thanks for the comments all.
Cindi, I did work with the sliders while processing this image to try and add some additional tonal separation but couldn't take it much further. It brings up a good point though I probably settled a bit buy accepting that the original shot was a little flat instead of pressing forward.
Thanks Again
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