Monday, January 18, 2010

Degas Little Dancer with Monet Water Lilies, SLAM



Susan asked that I make this picture, so I must give her art direction credit.  We came upon this scene yesterday as we were walking through the few galleries still open at the St. Louis Art Museum since the expansion project started.  My first few shots were with a 50mm, but they failed to convey the impression one gets because the Monet is too small in the frame.  The picture was made with a 180mm to pull the painting closer to the statue.  A big technical problem here is the mix of tungsten and skylight, which tends to muddy the colors.  Lightroom actually could not fully adjust the color properly without introducing some posterizaton artifacts, so I tried further editing in Nik Vivenza 2.

Technical: Nikon D700, Nikkor 180mm f2.8 (Leni lens), ISO 1600, f/2.8 @ 1/200s, handheld.  RAW file processed in Lightroom 2.6 with further editing in Nik Dfine to reduce noise (some was visible in shadows) and Nik Vivenza 2 to tweak color and contrast.  As capable as Lightroom is, I can see the value add of the Nik products.

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