I debated whether this image was share worthy or not for quite a while. Made on the same day as the shapely dead tree and foliage at Brickyard, the light was not favorable. But the color was irresistible so I made a couple of exposures and chose this one to process.
I cropped off as much of the white sky as I could without clipping the treetops. I considered trying out Photoshop’s new sky replacement tool but really don’t like the idea of faking an image so resisted. And then the light in the trees wouldn’t have matched that in the sky so just as well to leave it. It is what it was. And my pride remains intact. 🙂
My favorite part of this image is the little squiggle of orange at the bottom.
Stephen Gingold Nature Photography Blog 
I think it is blog worthy! I love autumn tapestries like this.
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Thanks, Eliza. Tapestry is good description.
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I like the picture as it is….
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Thanks, Rudi! So do I, but sometimes one wonders about things. 🙂
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You made the right decision, Steve. And by cropping the undefined sky you really put the emphasis where it belonged. The colours of this fall scene are amazing.
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I always prefer relative honesty in my images. By relative I mean that I do process for what I Interpreted at the time of exposure. Strictly allowing the camera to decide how something should look isn’t very challenging or creative. But I have never faked an image and don’t plan on doing it any time soon.
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I feel very much the same about processing. I like to enhance some aspects of the image that the camera missed or emphasize a colour that appears a bit weak.
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It is gorgeous color–glad you shared. I like that squiggle too!
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Thanks, Tina. Sometimes it’s the little things that count.
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Very nice Steve! And I agree on replacing skies! Seems like it is Fake and Cheating on being a “Real” photographer. But maybe 🤔 OK for Artists!
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Thanks, Reed. The only time I’ve ever done a compositie, which the sky replacement would fall into, is a full moon when I am using a wide angle which renders the moon a tiny dot. But even then I’ve only done it once or twice to represent reality.
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I really like it, and while the sky isn’t always exciting these days, the colourful autumn foliage easily makes up for it!
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Thanks, Sel! I like the moodiness of days like that and find the color more appealing than when in the full sunlight. Glad you liked it too.
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The trees are lovely, but I really wish you’d left more of the sky. To me, the image feels truncated, as though you tried to squeeze too much into the frame, or get rid of something that didn’t fit in the upper part of the frame. Of course, I’m not entirely opposed to gray skies, so there’s that. Sometimes the cool sky complements this kind of color — at least, for me.
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If the sky was gray with some clouds to break it up I would have included it as I have in the past. The only reason this sky has any gray at all is I darkened it with a curves layer. I can see why it appears truncated to you…because it is.
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I like the amount of cropped sky that you’ve left because it feels like it balances the bottom strip of brownish grass. And (like Eliza) I can see the rich, warm colours as a tapestry or perhaps an abstract painting.
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Thanks for noticing that balance, Ann. My main concern was to not have overwhelming white in the sky but did crop with the bottom in mind.
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The foliage is very pretty and I especially love the rich deep reds. But I love everything of course, because how could the reds stand out so beautifully without the lovely contrasts around them?
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Thanks, Liz. That’s a nice way to put it. As much as I like the “riot” of color I often prefer some greens mixed in as kind of a balance of the color wheel. 🙂
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I see what you mean about the little orange squiggle. Your title reminds me of the old “Does she or doesn’t she?” Clairol commercials.
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Well, the answer to that one might be up for debate but the answer to this is…yes and no. I should share it but I shouldn’t composite. I’d rather an honest white sky than a fake blue one.
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In many cases we take what we can get, and you certainly got some color here. I can’t say I’ll never try it, but so far I’ve steered away from sky replacement or similar techniques. I do one day want to try some composited digital art pieces, but those would likely be far more obviously not natural. And I tend to spend most of my time in Lightroom so I haven’t advanced in Photoshop skills nearly as far as I’d have liked.
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There is no end it seems to what can be done in Photoshop and Lightroom does have a lot of ability to work on images with no touching by PS. The new 2022 version of PS has some advanced masking features which I have read will allow us to make adjusts like never before although they may be similar to what we can do with luminosity masks. I took a look at what sky replacement could do and for some images I suppose it would be a fun thing to pursue. But I don’t see myself using it at all. I’d much rather have a less than stellar image that was honest than a faked one that gets a thousand oohs and aahs.
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