Hidden Detail

Sometimes full detail in an image can be a distraction: overpowering the eyes and not allowing the viewer to naturally find their way through the scene.

Then again, sometimes, detail has a impact of its own.

I’m still experimenting with infra-red photography, but one early conclusion is that there is a lot of detail that can be extracted. As with colour digital images, but I believe more so with IR, post processing is essential and critical.

Here is a RAW IR of a trip I did to Utah in 2014. I was attracted to this dead tree as I thought its bark would result in a distinctive contrast differentiation against the sky. However, I didn’t want a simple silhouette, with the bark ‘blocked up’.

Processing was pretty straight forward: starting in Lightroom with a colour cast correction, based on a profile I created in Adobe DNG Profiler. I next carried a basic tonal adjustment and applied a little dehaze adjust, which I find works well with IR images.

I also used Piccure+ to mazimise the ‘sharpness’ and address some noise. B&W creation on this occasion was limited to LR, rather than Silver Efex Pro II. I finally applied a little edge burning to create a separation for the image. I tried black, but preferred white on this occasion.

For those that have yet to experiment with IR, I think you will be surprised at the detail you can extract. From my experience, visible and IR sunlight present radically different photographic challenges.