Merino is the breed of sheep, Monaro is the region. I took this with a distinctly vintage lens - on some shots I like the effect, not quite sure if it works on this one. Show me what you can do - I need cheering up!
BTW, for anyone interested in geography, this is around 15km south of Cooma, on Maffra Rd. The peaks in the far distance are the Tinderry Ranges, which look quite impressive in the east when one passes Michelago (small township) on the way to Canberra. I call them the Michelago Mountains.
Since it’s too hot (40C) and too clear around here to shoot for myself, might as well process some images (ironically, one of wool!) Although I have to say the color of the grass here pretty much matches my back yard… crispy!!
This is entirely in ART 1.20.1.
Cropped 16x10, since IMO that ‘fits’ with the wide-open landscape. Also it removed a distracting fence post (?) on the right edge.
Using a gradient mask, pushed the far distance a little bluer to emphasize the receding distance. Coupled with the warm foreground it makes a nice duotone look IMO.
Off-center vignette on the sheep facing the viewer, plus subtle tonal gradients on top and bottom to further emphasize the middle of the image as well as control the white sky.
Added a little local contrast to the sheep only via a brush and gradient mask. Also used the same type of masks to very subtly 1) desaturate the sheep and 2) boost contrast, so they appear slightly whiter / contrastive to stand out just a touch.
Other usual stuff: Defringe, very slight RL convolution sharpening to tighten up the foreground grasses a little, added a second tone curve for contrast, boosted L*a*b* chroma just a little…
I think my personal favorite is @lphilpot’s version - and thanks for the detailed explanation too - followed by @Thomas_Do’s monochrome version… but it was hard to decide!
Yup. We’re not looking forward to summer (in some ways) - there’s a good chance of a bad fire season this year…
@dqpcoxeas Now that’s an interesting crop… it works… would never have though of that!
Although I have to say the color of the grass here pretty much matches my back yard… crispy!!
