[Play Raw] Salamander in the woods

So I finally went out on my first actual photo excursion yesterday. Until now the only pictures I ever took was just messing about in the yard trying to figure out my first DSLR. Went for a hike at the nearby state park and while on the trail I stumbled across this little guy.

For me as a newbie photographer this shot was really hard to take. It was really overcast still from a lot of the storms we have been having and this particular trail was pretty thick woods so the light was terrible. The raw is rather noisy and I knew it would be so to limit it slightly It ended up being pretty underexposed.

See what you can do with this little guy.

20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.cr2 (25.8 MB)
This file is licensed Creative Commons, By-Attribution, Share-Alike
(Creative Commons, By-Attribution, Share-Alike)

Processed with Darktable 2.6.2
20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.cr2.xmp (8.9 KB)

3 Likes

Thanks for sharing. Almost missed him or her first time I saw the photo. Unfortunately, our subject is obscured by what looks like a fallen branch, no doubt making it hard to focus on.

Sometimes I think the most important part of photography is hearing the click.

20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.cr2.pp3 (11.2 KB)

2 Likes

Had fun with this photo. Made 2 crop variants. Could have de-noised but don’t have a good custom method yet; yes, I like to make my own commands. Still much to learn. :blush:

PhotoFlow minimal linear no-clip float, with raised shadows.
gmic local contrast, 2 curves, focus-crop (2 variants), 3 curves, sharpen-resize.

Crop 1

Crop 2

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There’s something about that stick that makes me think of stick insect. Why?

I thought about the same, in which country/region has this picture been taken?

Here’s my edit:

20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.cr2.xmp (10.8 KB)

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@pphoto United States/Pennsylvania.
Really liking your edit as well. I never thought about rotating the frame like that makes the picture feel very dynamic. Also feels nice and earthy love it.

Loving the edits so far everyone.

@HIRAM I really like that take on the crop. I also like how different the photo feels with the extra warmth to the colors.

@afre that is awesome how you got 2 photos out of one. The first one is really neat because it feels like the Salamander is walking through the frame.

Just like @pphoto, I also went for the two diagonal branches and salamander being at the point of their intersection. Still learning darktable. Thanks for sharing this challenging image @blj.

20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.cr2.xmp (34.3 KB)

2 Likes

Difficult task.

20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.cr2.xmp (6.1 KB)

20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.cr2.xmp (12.7 KB)

1 Like

20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.cr2.xmp (10.5 KB)

Thanks everyone for participating. I am really enjoying all the various different takes on the picture. Everyone of them provoke slightly different feelings so awesome :grin:

Had a bit of curiosity on how my gmic distortion gui filter will change this image. 2 iteration of Strange Bulger Kaleidoscope (Improved and Extended from a PDN plugin source code).

3 Likes

Calm:

image

Angry:

image

3 Likes

My like only for “calm” :wink: .

1 Like

20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.jpg.out.pp3 (12,4 KB)

20190531-092259-LackawannaStatePark_BullHillTrail-0037.cr2.pp3 (11.8 KB)