Exaggerating to Accentuate

When DW and I went camping, last weekend, I gave thought to the cameras that I wanted to take with me.

Even though we were car-camping and we had space for all of my camera gear, I was thinking about our next trip, where we won't have our car and will have to carry everything in our kayaks to our camp site, I wanted to give thought to what I needed to carry, versus what I simply wanted to carry.

I knew that I wanted to take my 360-degree video camera, to capture all aspects of our trip. I always keep my smartphone on me, so that was another camera with three lenses built in. But I also wanted to bring one of my D-SLRs to capture some high-quality stills.

As it turned out, I rarely used my D-SLR. I had packed my Nikon D7200 with my 70–300mm lens, thinking that I would use it to photograph any wildlife we encountered. But I forgot to pack my dry bag and couldn't take my D-SLR in the kayak. I missed out on capturing some birds and several beavers that we came upon as we paddled the lakes and rivers around Samuel de Champlain Provincial Park.

So I relied heavily on my Insta360 One R and my smartphone, and that's okay. I wasn't able to zoom in tightly to any wildlife but I did get some decent photos, especially at sunset.

In post-processing, I exaggerated some of my photos to better-match what my eyes had picked up and to add a bit of drama. On one evening, as we paddled around Moore Lake, we kept close to the vast growth of pickerelweed, which seemed to go on forever. The purple flowers poked just above the green leaves, and the contrast in colour was stunning.

The sun, which was ever-sinking toward the treeline at the distant shore of the lake, lit up the flowers and seemed to make them glow. I took several shots but in looking at them afterward, the camera didn't quite do the scene justice.

So in post-processing, I pumped up the light contrast and upped the colour saturation. I lowered the highlights to give more definition to the clouds and sun. I reduced the shadows, so that the colour and details of the background trees matched what my eyes could see.

Here is the end result of one of my favourite shots of that evening.

What do you think? Too much?

(Note: if you look just below the sun, where the pickerelweed meets the forest, you can just make out DW's paddle, as she kayaks through a gap in the marsh—you can click the photo to enlarge it. Kinda gives you an idea of how tall these plants are, doesn't it?)

Sometimes, I feel that you have to exaggerate to accentuate. You have to over-compensate to convey not only the visual but the emotional aspects of the scenery.

What do you feel when you see this photo? Too much or just right?

Happy Friday!