Frequency Separation

This week I mentioned how a technique called 'Frequency Separation' helped me fix my desert picture 'Tracks of the Desert'. Now I would like to demonstrate why. If you look at the 2 photos below, you can see in the original RAW image (with slight processing before being exported to Photoshop) there is a lot of dirt/murkiness to the right of the picture. It is in other parts as well. Now I assume this was caused by the thick, sandy desert landscape, but nevertheless, I knew it would not look good in my final image.

My finished image is not perfect, and hasn't completely eradicated the dirt, but the Frequency Separation technique (normally used in portraiture photography) helped me eliminate the poorer parts to a large degree. If you watch the video tutorial below by Glyn Dewis, it explains all the elements of using this technique, and it was indeed this video that helped me solve my desert problem. I hope you find some use for it in the future!

Tracks of the Desert

The Arabian desert; a place perhaps few are lucky to visit, and the mind conjuring up images of Lawrence of Arabia are plentiful. In the 21st century however, you see a lot of tracks like the ones above, courtesy of the arabian adventure cars that deflate their tyres and roar over the sand dunes. It certainly was an adventure to take a trip in one of these, but the best parts for me were the frequent stops to take in the desert landscape, and if you were lucky, see an Oryx or 2 (we did). I took so many close up and landscape pictures of the desert that day, as I could not stop my sense of awe over the patterns of the desert.

It's almost certain that the big cars help create these patterns (like to the bottom left which I really love), but it doesn't really matter. Just to capture them in the late afternoon, as the sun goes down, is enough for me not to worry about if nature or man created them. I had to put the post-processing of this picture on the shelf for a while, as the desert mist made this look very murky and dirty, and I did not know how I was going to get round this. Then at The Photography Show recently, I saw Glyn Dewis present a technique called 'Frequency Separation' that helped me alleviate the problem to a high degree. I'll explain more about this on Thursday, or at the weekend.

Presenting the image in lo-res as it is above, is not the best way to view this picture. The low resolution does not capture the desert detail very well.

Therefore, please click the link, to see it at full resolution at HalewoodPhotographic.com.

Through the Arabian Desert

One of the highlights of my recent trip to Dubai, in fact one of only 2 times I left the vicinity of our hotel complex, was to travel through the Arabian desert by jeep. I'm not really one for extreme adventures, but it was a lot of fun how these jeeps absolutely motor through the desert, not fearing any steep slope or tight angle. I was in the 2nd car of 6 in our group, so there were times where we stopped for photographic opportunities of the other jeeps, which played very well into my hands.

Like my last picture, this was processed entirely in Lightroom.

Camels in the Sand

This is one of those pictures I have planned to blog for months, but just never got round to making the decision to do it (I think?!). The other night I was going through some of my pictures with my wife, and she commented that she loves this picture, so then I realised the time was right to show it.

It's not the most obvious place to take a picture, on top of a camel, but how else would you get this angle? It was totally spur of the moment, as we were getting a guided camel ride throughout the Sinai desert in Egypt. Even with a VR lens, many of the pictures I took on the camel journey were very shaky and blurry, but luckily this one I took of the shadows in the sand came out fine. This was processed entirely in Adobe Lightroom.