One Negative, Two "Prints"

[C. D. Keth]

I thought it would be of interest to people on this forum to see the same negative worked on by two different people. Maybe this can even become a running thread, pushing us into more active critique of our own and others images. I feel like this forum needs more of that.

In the trees thread, I posted a photo that Bryan (Corran) thought might have more potential than was realized. Always being up for a learning exercise, I downsized the .tif scan so it was more reasonable to transfer and Bryan was nice enough to do his own edit.

My original edit is on the left while Bryan's is on the right. My edit is pretty dark, brooding. I guess I was grumpy that day. I tend to like a darker quality look but I do think I perhaps went too far and made things too muddy. It was pointed out that my "highlights" were really only upper midtones. Bryan's edit most certainly occupies more of the full range of a print. I love his midtone quality. It has a sparkle that my edit lacks. I don't think I recognized that my negative was capable of that.

With this exercise in mind, I will certainly be revisiting this negative. I would like to try to blend my deeper shadow feel with some of Bryan's midtone look.

Again, my edit is on the left and Bryan's is on the right:

[Corran]

Thanks for letting me try my hand at your scan, and again, great photo! It is nice to discuss different methodologies and techniques.

[ImSoNegative]

cool idea for a thread, i like the contrast in the 2nd one, the mood of the first one, nice shot, what format is this?

[C. D. Keth]

cool idea for a thread, i like the contrast in the 2nd one, the mood of the first one, nice shot, what format is this?

I like those same things. I'm hoping my reworking can meld those two qualities you like. It's 4x5 size fomapan-200 rated at 100 and developed in pyrocat-HD.

[stradibarrius]

WOW...this is great for me to see how one negative can be interpreted. I like this idea! I think it would be something that I could really learn from. I hope this thread has "legs"???
After you took the original shot, how did you get it to Corran?

[ImSoNegative]

I believe its a digital file, he said something to the effect of downsizing the tif file

[chassis]

I like the pop of the right image, which also has warmer tones to my eye. I prefer cooler toned images, so I wonder what a version would look like with the contrast of the right with the image tone of the left one?

[Corran]

Yep, I warm-tone most of my images, even though my standard printing paper is cold-toned.

If you right-click --> download the image, you can desaturate it to be a standard gray-scale image, or, cold-tone it to your liking, to see for yourself.

Yes strad, Chris just uploaded the file to his webpage and sent me the link. I do the same thing to display photos here.

[Jody_S]

Interesting. On the right, I like the contrast of the tree, but I find the burned-out sky on the top right is distracting. I also like the tone. On the left, I like the lower contrast overall, but I find the cooler tone doesn't suit the subject especially well. I would personally prefer an image somewhat in-between the two for contrast (but closer to the left), with a warmer tone. Of course, that's only looking at a computer monitor. If this were printed fairly large, I think the one on the left would be just fine.

[E. von Hoegh]

I thought it would be of interest to people on this forum to see the same negative worked on by two different people. Maybe this can even become a running thread, pushing us into more active critique of our own and others images. I feel like this forum needs more of that.

In the trees thread, I posted a photo that Bryan (Corran) thought might have more potential than was realized. Always being up for a learning exercise, I downsized the .tif scan so it was more reasonable to transfer and Bryan was nice enough to do his own edit.

My original edit is on the left while Bryan's is on the right. My edit is pretty dark, brooding. I guess I was grumpy that day. I tend to like a darker quality look but I do think I perhaps went too far and made things too muddy. It was pointed out that my "highlights" were really only upper midtones. Bryan's edit most certainly occupies more of the full range of a print. I love his midtone quality. It has a sparkle that my edit lacks. I don't think I recognized that my negative was capable of that.

With this exercise in mind, I will certainly be revisiting this negative. I would like to try to blend my deeper shadow feel with some of Bryan's midtone look.

Again, my edit is on the left and Bryan's is on the right:

A combination of the contrast of the right one with just a bit of the cool tones of the left would be just about right to my eye.

Excellent idea for a thread, by the way.