A view I never get tired of, the swivel railroad bridge in Dubuque, Iowa. I made the picture a week ago, when the bridge was open for the barge traffic on the Mississippi River. A “spot light” by the low sitting sun onto the swivel part of the bridge, combined with some lovely clouds, made me push the shutter release button. The photo is pretty much what I saw, with just a little bit of dodge and burn at the cloud reflections on the water. This slight touch in post process reveals what I really had in mind when I took the photo. I know, this classic view has been photographed by many before, including myself. I just couldn’t resist to add another picture… 😉
FOLLOWING THE CURVE (PART 2)
If this looks familiar you must have visited my blog a few days ago. Today I tried the same image as a black and white version. I had this in mind when I took the shot but later at home, in front of the computer screen, the play with the color contrast appealed to me as well. Now, with both versions on hand, I think the monochrome version supports the graphic impact of this photo better. The Z-shaped curve of the clouds and the edge of the field are better pronounced.
As much as I like the relativ new B&W presets in Adobe Lightroom Classic, for the finishing of this image I used the well trusted NIK Silver Efex Pro 2. In Lightroom I started with the same Camera RAW settings as for the color version, opened the photo as a Smart Object in Photoshop, and finally applied NIK Silver Efex Pro 2 as a filter. I still love the way how global and local adjustments interact with each other in any program of the NIK Suite. The final touch was made with a subtle dodging and burning layer in PS, mainly in the lower half of the photo.