Winter Dune Grass II, a photo from Indiana, Midwest

Photographer's Note

With the recent major early February 2011 blizzard snowfall in the Chicago/Northwest Indiana area (18-20 inches / 45-50cm), my photographer wife and I took a trip to the nearby Dunes National Lakeshore (on the southern edge of Lake Michigan) to explore any photo opportunities with the snow on the lakeshore.

This is a winter view of this tall clump of dune grass along the lakeshore near the beach.

The light was in the "golden hours" about 1-2 hours before sunset. The very saturated blue sky was part of the original image with the use of a polarizer.

Basic RAW/PS5/Nik processing including noise reduction, color balancing, brightness/contrast, and some sharpening. I did run this through Nik HDR single-image tone mapping processing to achieve this final result.

A different view of this subject is available on my Trek Lens page: Winter Dune Grass

worldcitizen, SnapRJW, timecapturer, Carol_Lynn, skippy007, agulberk, agulberk, fritzi007, MLINES, rmajum, ingvar, sms, Kofman has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

worldcitizen (15930) 2011-03-03 19:29

Hello Larry,
I really like the golden sunlight in this photo, and the creative POV, allowing the grass to appear above the line of clouds in the distance. I can get a good sense of the cold from this photo, and the golden color of the grass rising into the blue sky is also very nice.

[2]

SnapRJW (31631) 2011-03-03 22:25

Hello Larry - I love you POV on this shot; the golden grass against that blue sky is lovely so the low horizon works well. Focus is a slight issue in th FG but your composition is super. TFS Rosemary

siudzi (34141) 2011-03-04 1:50

Hi Larry,
Excellent winter shot! Love color contrast and great light. Beautiful composition. Congrats!
Best, Malgorzata

timecapturer (49288) 2011-03-04 2:57

Hi Larry
a great POV and a majestic clump of grass, that glows in the late sunshine. Wonderful shadows and textures on the ground. Highly original and well seen.

Brian

MJR (3360) 2011-03-04 15:20

Hello Larry
Aha - the mysterious Brech ! I see you leave 'useful' notes from time to time, and only just thought to click through !
I like this, your TL version may be better still, for its simplicity and combination of juxtapostion of colours. But how tall is tall ? It could be feet, or maybe thats an illusion, from the size of bumps on the gorund, it may only be some inches.. Hmmn ?
regards
Martin

skippy007 (12510) 2011-03-05 14:14

Hi Larry, I prefer this to the Tl one, both beautiful winter images & very similar but this one leans into the frame, I find this more appealing. I want to complement you on your note, very informative, full of information, where, when & how. Appreciated workflow. Thanks
Santo
Will look at Nik HDR as well.

agulberk (3794) 2011-03-10 6:39

Hi Larry
Wonderful composition with snow and shadows on the snow under clear blue sky and clouds on the horizon.
Winter Dune Grass are very remarkable. I saw this very long gold color grass firstly. Colors seem to be most compatible. Vertical framing was accurate.
Regards
Greetings...

ptiza (727) 2011-03-13 9:39

Hello Larry,
This is a very beautiful composition. Nice color contrast and great light.

With best regards,
Irena

fritzi007 (14698) 2011-03-19 13:45

Hi Larry!
Wonderful photo, brilliant colors, truly a very high quality, congratulations!
Wish you a nice weekend
Wolfgang

MLINES (12516) 2011-03-25 14:53

Hi Larry, An appealing nature photograph with good composition. The low horizon works well and the variety of textures makes for a fine image. TFS. Murray

ingvar (2106) 2011-04-06 11:17

What a beautiful piece of art, dear Lary!

The colors are amazing, sharp and deep sky. And against this background that bush seems as if it were weapons of ancient warriors, spears put together in a circle, after a glorious battle!
Very well done!
I.