Mist and Golden Leaves

Woke up in plenty of time to head up to Weston Park before dawn, with the promise of misty/foggy conditions.  The best conditions seem to occur when the sun begins to burn through and today was no exception, lighting the new growth on the trees around Temple Pool.  

Technical: I really struggled with this image.  Exposure was relatively easy, the scene had a limited dynamic range so I just exposed to the right to make sure I captured as much information as possible.  Back on the computer I dialled in some black to increase contrast, but almost immediately dialled most of it back out again.  It was the very high key nature of the scene that worked for me, but I needed to bring out some more detail in the tree with the golden leaves.  In the end I used a low opacity luminosity layer to better define the trunk and branches, masking most of the rest of the scene.  Bumped up the clarity very slightly and used a touch of vibrance.

I have probably 3 or 4 images that will have to be added to my shortlist for the exhibition after today.  It happens like this sometimes.  Other days and weeks hardly anything is captured that merits inclusion.  Bumped into Andrea from Weston Park as I was leaving and had a chat about the forthcoming exhibition.  It also seems that some of my images of the park were included in the Shropshire Life magazine in January (with my permission).