Ta Phrom Temple

very nice places. exposure seems off on both. two dark in the first and too bright in the 2nd. the first could have used a bit of off camera flash fill and in the 2nd pic, could you have possibly added a flash from one side to the other? meaning the inside right side shooting to the left and the left side shooting to the right?

rocketman122 said:

very nice places. exposure seems off on both. two dark in the first and too bright in the 2nd. the first could have used a bit of off camera flash fill and in the 2nd pic, could you have possibly added a flash from one side to the other? meaning the inside right side shooting to the left and the left side shooting to the right?

Click to expand...

1st photograph: This was taken at one of the most photographed sites in the temple (boyfriend snaps pic of girlfriend in front of tree) so to start with I had to work around 1,000 tourists to even get a shot. I wanted to get a different type of photograph though. So I used my 24-70mm lens to grab the whole tree from 70' away. Of course the very bright sky blew the rest of the detail out. Cropped, sharpened, and converted to B/W. Adjusted the contrast heavily. From there I was able lighten the whole frame without blowing out the sky even more. It is dark and moody ... but that is the effect I was looking for. Not an average tourist snap at Ta Phrom! Ansel Adams would have loved it.

2nd Photograph: Taken from 50' away (no flash work from that distance ) and cropped down. Sharpened slightly and converted to B/W. WYSIWYG. True to life. It is what I saw. (The difference between an artist and a technician in my opinion)

I do see your observations but it isn't what I look to achieve in my photographs. I do appreciate your comments though.

1000 tourists? damn you got a good clean shot for 1000 tourists. thats quite the catch. when I have a very contrasty scene, I use active D lighting to get a wider dynamic range. or you can shoot raw and bring back shadows and do highlight recovery

but something like this.