Zubovići is a hidden gem located in the heart of the island of Pag, Croatia. Originally known as Sridnje Selo (Central Village) due to its strategic position in the Gulf of Pag, it is part of the picturesque Barbati area, along with Kustići, Vidalići, and Metajna. This small village enchants visitors with its unique contrast: an almost lunar landscape, dominated by dry-stone walls and sparse vegetation, plunging into a crystal-clear sea with a thousand shades of blue.
Tried to keep the appearance of a blazing sun, darkened the blues and intensified the red roofs and greens a bit. And yet get back a sliver of color in the white of one of the houses…
A thousand shades of blue? Best I can do is 255.
White balance on a little unclipped area of the white square building. Some rotation with RGB primaries. Not much change to my default AgX settings.
Edited with ART 1.18. I used the auto-matched tone curve for a Z6, then boosted the contrast a little because the scene is so bright. White balance was sampled from the boat just to camera right of the people.
It wasn’t the best time of day. The sun’s impact on the landscape is excessive, as is the contrast. My first priority, therefore, was to tone down that brightness without losing the sense of an intense sun; to achieve this, I dialed back the exposure in the sky and the lake, while maintaining the intensity of the dwellings—all without sacrificing texture or detail in the highlights on their walls. I also reduced the noise in the sky.
In reality, it’s about 8:30 / 9 AM, but since the beach faces west, it was fully lit from the front, so yes it wasn’t the best moment to shoot. Just to be clear, we’re talking about the Adriatic Sea, not a lake. Noise in the sky? What noise?
I removed the rotation and the tonemapper and gave it the ‘masked CB-RGB’ treatment. Wasn’t sure about what to do with the ground’s colour though.
Edit: Probably a good candidate for the new masking? I’ve accidentally turned the buoy net thing blue, as well as a bird on the water, the near boat and the person’s hat. Just the effects of trying to push the blue hues apart. And there’s a band of water near the top that isn’t caught by the parameters, that might benefit from the added blue.
New xmp that mitigates some of that: _DSC0036.NEF.xmp (22.2 KB)
The alternative is just not using the 4 ways tab (except global offset chroma maybe) and only using master saturation and hue rotation.
My editing was aggressive in some areas, which has brought out the natural noise in your file. Here is a sample. I’m not saying your photograph has noise; rather, it’s “my” processing that has introduced it.
