POST & DISCUSS: Triptych Photography

[neske]

.... How's the first attempt? (I'm not sure about the central photo)


http://upload.pbase.com/image/74869358

Congratulation on your first attempt! As you can see here, we are all the beginners in this form of photography and we all need help to improve.

I can make couple of suggestions, assuming that your tryptich purpose is to show the calm beauty of sand dunes and surrounding nature.

- first, I would make sure that all photos have the same color cast. For example, change the color cast of the first photo to match the third one. First one has a touch of red in it and on the third one dominates blue. With the same color cast, they express unity.

- second, I would use a different subject matter for the middle photo. It dominates the tryptich with such a strong contrast between white piece of wood and the dark shadow. Eye is constantly drawn to the center, breaking the relaxing mood that first and last photo creates. With that said, if your intent was to create "visual friction", and to off-balance the tranquility expressed on the side photos, I would leave it.

- lastly, I would play with different background colors and see which one is best for the desired mood.

Hope this helps. Note that this is just a personal preference, at the end you should really trust your visual instincts.

[rileypm]

I had six photos that followed a theme but were too few to rate a gallery of their own. The photo shop technique allowed me to group them and place them in my misc. gallery as one. Thanks for the great tip. They can be viewed here:
http://www.pbase.com/rileypm/image/74894589

[ehreng]

Thanks, neske
I appreciate your input and I think you're right about color matching. Unfortunately, when I hunted through those particular photos, I couldn't find good ones that matched... the first in the set I made is sunset after a storm and the other is morning the next day, when the weather was a bit better. My other photos from the sand dunes just don't compare to those two anyway. I'll give it a whirl sometime with a different set of pictures from somewhere else though. As for the background, I was trying to find a color that blended with the sand. Maybe a creamy color would work better though.
Thanks again!

[viljamix]

Here's my attempt:

[jellophoto]

In response to Cellartroll,

Thanks for the positive comments Stephen. I note your point regarding the split tree, but the irony is that these two trees are probably about 30-40 miles apart. When I set up the triptych I purposefully set the two tree images like that to give the impression that they might be interpretted the way you suggest. The image on the left was shot near Catterick, in the Vale of York and the second was shot near Sherburn in Cassop Vale, just east of Durham (a favourite location of mine). The third was taken a few miles south east of Durham at Coxhoe. However your comment sent me scuttling back to my files to check in case you were right!!

They were all taken on bright frosty mornings, the first 2 on the same trip and the 3rd was taken the next day about the same time of day

Regards John

[halesr]

I consider this one to be more of a montage than a triptych, but it might fit here.



http://www.pbase.com/image/55735502

It is three different images of the same pears and three different edge treatments put together to make a single image.

The following is the same image with 3 different treatments.



http://www.pbase.com/halesr/image/57684268

--Rene

[ibill]

Never heard of the term Triptych, but I did this a few months ago
for a friend.

[neske]

Vote for one above. Excellent timing and great lighting. Were they taken in the studio?

[neske]

I consider this one to me more of a montage than a triptych, but it might fit here.



--Rene

Nice Job! Can you share with the rest of us some Photoshop tricks that went into this montage?

[ibill]

Vote for one above. Excellent timing and great lighting. Were they taken in the studio?

I took some of my lighting equipment to a the parents house
and we set up in there guest bedroom. So a makeshift
studio, yes.

Glad you liked it,
Bill

[jellophoto]

Here is another for consideration



http://www.pbase.com/jellophoto

[neske]

Couple of new attempts:

Beach close-up


Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica


http://www.pbase.com/neske/travel_triptych

[neske]

Here is another for consideration



http://www.pbase.com/jellophoto

I personally prefer this one over the previous one. I can easily picture it on the wall in one of the galleries downtown Chicago.

The only suggestion would be to try to balance the visual weight of composition. The tree on the left side is visually heavier then the rest of the canvas; it doesn't have something on the other side to counter balance it. With that said, visual appearance is very subjective matter is other viewers may not have the same perception.

[halesr]

neske

Nice Job! Can you share with the rest of us some Photoshop tricks that went into this montage?

I used Photo/Graphic Edges by auto fx software. One of the effects is "montage". I made a plain white background the size to fit the three images and then I brought in the images one at a time and select the edge treatment I wanted to use. It is a plug-in that works with Photoshop, or you can use it as a standalone program.

Here is a link to a description of the software http://www.autofx.com/pge_6/pge_6.html

When I purchased my software, I also bought the training CD.

HTH--Rene

[neske]

neske

Nice Job! Can you share with the rest of us some Photoshop tricks that went into this montage?

I used Photo/Graphic Edges by auto fx software.

Here is a link to a description of the software http://www.autofx.com/pge_6/pge_6.html

HTH--Rene

Thanks Rene! The software package looks quite interesting. Would you say it is worth the money? Do you use it a lot? I'll have to do some good selling to my wife