When I saw the word “cloudscape” this morning it made me think immediately of these Paris cloudscapes. I captured them on a day I spent exploring Paris along the Seine River. The clouds were very dramatic that day and they often seemed to outline the landmarks. No “boring” blue skies for me! While it actually rained very little, the clouds providing the “scattered showers” also provided interesting skies as a backdrop to the iconic land marks of Paris.
Ile de Saint Louis
Pont Neuf and Ile de la Cite
Looking up river toward the islands and bridges of Paris.
Looking down river toward the Eiffel Tower and Pont des Invalides.
Yesterday did not feel at all like spring. A chilly, gray day, so dark that photos came out almost black and white. Sometimes converting to black and white can be more appealing than a photo where the colors are muddy gray from a lack of light. Also, it is easier to bring out the details in black and white clouds. So I gave it a try.
Technique for black and white clouds
To coax out the cloud details in the above photos I blended together two layers in the GIMP*. The first used desaturation (colors>desaturate>desaturate). The second layer used the color-to-gray algorithm (colors>desaturate>color-to-gray). Then I used the multiply blend mode on the top layer (the color-to-gray one) and applied a layer mask to limit the effect to the sky.
*GIMP stands for Gnu Image Manipulation Program; it is open source (free) software. I’ve never used Photo Shop, but many compare the GIMP to it. The GIMP resides on your computer and does not require internet (“cloud”) access.
Quick Note:
In case you are unfamiliar, the quotes at the top are from The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss:
