One-to-Three Photo Processing Challenge-November 2022

Join the One-to-Three Photo Processing Challenge to have some creative fun with photos.

The purpose of the One-to-Three Photo Processing Challenge is to play. These days we have so many different ways to process a photo: from phone apps to Photoshop. And these different software options make it accessible for anyone to get fun and beautiful effects. Whether you have a lot of time or a little.

I’ve been spending a lot of my pandemic playing with photo processing. Because it is a relaxing indoor activity that I can do for free (I mostly use open-source programs and old versions of paid programs). And I thought it might be fun to share what I’ve been doing and see what other folks are trying out.

No complicated rules, just:

1. Pick a photo you want to play with.
2. Process it using three different methods.
3. After that create a blog post with the original and your creative products. Alternatively, if it is easier for you, you could post a gallery on Instagram with #tsc_1to3.
4. If you can, please include a description of your methods. So others can give them a whirl.
5. Then add a comment below containing the link to your post (pingbacks don’t work). So we can all see your creations.
6. Check out what other folks are doing for new ideas.

I can hardly wait to see what you create.

September creations:

• This, that and the other (September)
• This, that and the other (October)
• Cee’s Photography
• Ritva Sillanmaki Photography
• Pictures Imperfect blog (September)
• Pictures Imperfect blog (October)
• Two cameras-two views

I seem to have inadvertently missed a couple of September creations in my October list of posts. My sincerest apologies. I think I got everyone this time, plus make-ups. Also, do let me know if I take more than a day to approve your link, my security plug in makes me approve all comments with a link so sometimes there is a, hopefully quite short, delay between when you post and when I get the link approved.

Here’s my one-to-three contribution for this month:

Lighthouses

I grabbed this shot on a Casco Bay boat tour. It is seriously over exposed and the details I wanted were dark. I knew it when I took the photo, but couldn’t resist trying to capture the two lighthouses in one picture. The closest light house is Spring Point Ledge and the one in the distance is Portland Head. I decided to see what Topaz Products could do with it. I decided to do this because the masking capabilities in Topaz Studio 2 are simpler than using luminosity masks in the GIMP and I wanted to work with different parts of the picture separately.

Directions for my methods:

This month I primarily used Topaz Studio 2 to play with this photo.

First I processed the photo in Raw Therapee. Here is what came out of that:

Note: for curiosity’s sake, I ran this image through Topaz’s new “Photo AI” program. The results were underwhelming; it just removed a little noise. The results from that are only visible if you zoom way in on files to big to post on line. If you have been thinking about this software, my recommendation is that you wait a bit. I haven’t yet tested it on an image where I couldn’t get the same, or better results by using other options. (I’m a crappy affiliate marketer!)

Then I took the photo into Topaz Studio 2. I used a variety of filters, including AI Clear, dehaze, basic adjustment and HSL color tuning, to tame the glare and bring out the details. I used the masking to work with the sky and foreground separately. The second image above is the result of this step.

Then I played around with the preset Looks in Topaz Studio 2. The third version above is the “Bleached” look, found in Topaz Studio 2’s “Bright” group. It actually really captured how I felt when I took the picture, leaning into the brightness of the sun on the water and how very blue the sky was that day.

Finally, I messed around with several of the filters in Topaz Studio 2’s Stylistic group and settled on this version which is an AI Remix filter applied over an Abstraction filter. I think the AI Remix really helped to tame the water reflections and bring the focus onto the lighthouses.

Share your One-to-Three creations in the comments below.