The composition of the lake, the fog, the yellow tamaracks and the silence was quite spectacular; it seemed so alien.
This shot was taken on a tripod. The lens was shut down to f/16 to get as much depth of field as possible as well as the sense of dimension that comes with that. I focused on the hyper-focal distance, which on the 50mm at f/16 is 525.8cm.
The shot was composed to capture the the grass (and berries) in front, the tamaracks, their reflection, the grass in the water on the right as well as the continuance of the water into the distance
I processed the image with Color Efex using the Polarization, Dark Contrasts, Bring out Detail, Skylight, and Darken-Lighten Center Filters.
In a second step, I processed the image through Photoshop Elements using the Craquelure, Water Paper, Glass and Sponge filters.
Readers will note the same filters repeating over many of these shots. I have settled on a set of filters for each package that gives me the results I’m looking for. For an individual shot I select the filters that work and disable the others. The details of each setting are a function of many factors, including how I feel that day. While this may seem an arbitrary constraint the process does a couple of things. First, anyone familiar with these packages knows that they provide many filters; it is just not feasible to try every one of the options and alternatives. It is necessary to hone in on a smaller set which one regularly uses that achieve the results sought. This would be one’s style. Next, it saves time. The set of alternatives is drastically reduced; processing can be completed in minutes rather than hours.
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