Adjustments

I don't have a really good photo editing program on my computer. I use the free one at pixlr.com. It's pretty handy for adjusting "levels" and saturation, contrast, color balance, etc. I don't know if you can use it for "photoshopping" pictures.

I've played with it to try to get a version of the photos of that canted cascade picture that is relatively accurate, because the photos straight out of the camera typically have white balance and  color balance issues. One of the biggest headaches for me with this and some other pictures has been that I honestly don't know what the picture truly looks like. Its appearance changes substantially during the day as the ambient light changes. It also looks quite a bit different under fluorescent light, which is what I use while painting. (I've tried different bulbs and I've settled on the "natural daylight" bulb as being the most neutral. Still, I've yet to see a bulb that mimics natural light.)

So, here are several versions, just to see if they appear any different posted on line. I'll probably delete this post after I've had a chance to look at it a bit. The first photo is the one I posted yesterday. The next two are the same photo but re-done in pixlr. The final two are two subsequent versions using different base photos I took.

(I published this and took a look at it, and then I deleted one photo and inserted the last one at the bottom. The others all seem kind of interchangeable, but the final one might be the closest to the actual picture in terms of color and warmth. We have good light today, so I was able to look at the picture and look at the photos to compare them. I'm pretty sure that last photo is the best one. If you're wondering why this matters at all, it's because I have this fear that the original might get destroyed, damaged, stolen, whatever. Since this is painted on Bristol board, if I have a good photo I can get a copy printed that somewhat matches the original. I hope that's never needed, of course.)

 

 

 

Look at how much "warmer" this last photo appears.I've compared a number of the forms in this photo to the painted picture, and the color accuracy (on my monitor) is pretty satisfactory. I think I'm done taking photos of this, at least for now. I might some day take more, because I didn't have the picture squared up perfectly, and when cropping it I had to cut off a little more of the perimeter than I would have wanted. Oh, well, I suppose compromises are part of life..... I hate compromises.