Mount Brown Lookout in B & W

[Ralph Thornton]

Chris suggested I try a B&W conversion of these photos. Well here they are. What do you think? I put the original versions below for comparison.
Ralph

From the trail about halfway up to the lookout. This view is across the Snyder Creek drainage toward Edwards Mountain.

The Mount Brown Lookout all plastered with snow.

The originals for comparison

 

[Rob MacKillop]

I love the new versions even more. Beautiful. So this your job, photographing beautiful landscapes? I'm jealous!

 

[Ralph Thornton]

Well if by job you mean something I make a bunch of money on, I've got a long way to go there. But I do enjoy getting out in the wilds and photographing the interesting landscapes we have here in Montana.

 

[Kev Pugh]

Edwards Mounain very Ansel Ralph love the PP suits really well

 

[adrian jordin]

The landscape works well in the B&W, but I can't say the new version of the lookout does a lot for me..
Brilliant photos though, whichever way you do them..

 

[Paul Lange]

I think the first one is certainly better in BW, it has more texture and is more dramatic.

 

[Pete Askew]

I agree and I do like the lookout. I keep expecting to see a couple of German soldiers peering out through the windows (and Clint Eastwood creeping up along the side). That aside, I love the B&W treatment of it.

 

[Ralph Thornton]

Thanks all. I'm still waiting for Chris to weigh in.

 

[Pete Askew]

He'll only tell you to crop them square - you know what he's like!!

 

[Ralph Thornton]

Oopps I forgot about that!

 

[Brian Moore]

I love the BW versions, Ralph.

 

[Chris Dodkin]

Oooooo Pete - you are awful!

Ralph - loving the B&W!

#1 is very Ansel, I think the nature of the image suits B&W with all the texture of the rocks and trees.

and #2, loving the way the B&W brings out the cloud detail

 

[Ralph Thornton]

I think I'm pretty pleased with the first shot of Edwards Mountain. But there's something about the lookout photo that i don't like. The snow just doesn't look right and is missing the details that should be there. Perhaps it was too blown out in the color version and I just didn't see that. Or I might have messed it up in the conversion to B&W. I agree that the sky looks nice though. Maybe I need to reprocess the image and do something a little different for all of the ground subjects while keeping the sky part the way it is.

Im also going to process the Edwards scene as a large image and see what detail I have. Then maybe print it in a decent sized print.

Thanks for the comments. They're all very helpful.
Ralph

 

[Chris Dodkin]

Maybe try a slight negative exposure grad to the lower section of the RAW image in Photoshop Ralph for #2?

Pull back the snow detail if it's there - worth a shot, and I see what you're talking about