While the main subjects in Antarctica were the dramatic landscapes and wildlife images, I also enjoyed capturing some candid Antarctica portraits while on the Zodiacs.
The textures of the fabrics were an important part of the images for me and tonal contrast adjustments in Nik ColorEfex Pro4 were used to optimise these. The bright orange of the parkas and life vests were quite overpowering and I found partially desaturated or Black and White images worked best to minimise that distraction. The partially desaturated images were made by placing a full colour layer above a fully desaturated layer and using Soft Light blend mode. Adjustment of the colour layer opacity allowed a further level of control if needed. The Black and White images were made using Nik Silver Efex Pro2.
Previous posts have had a number of images of Edin during the trip but when we got home I wanted to try and make an image celebrating our shared adventure and decided on a composited image that featured our magical moments with the Snow Petrels as that was probably the most memorable day of our trip. This image was made using the 2 images in a 5 layer stack including a desaturated portrait version and a layer using OnOne Perfect Effects and layer masks to combine the two images as I wanted them to create the final result.
Top 2 photos with Fuji X100s., next 2 with Nikon D810 and Nikon 24-120mm f4 VR lens.
Edin, Snow Petrel composite both with Nikon 200-400 f4 lens, portrait with Nikon D810 and Petrel and Iceberg with Nikon D3s
Laird Parry
6 Dec 2015Wow! Its an honor to have my portrait on your blog. Shawna and I love looking at your photos and Edin’s too. There is some serious talent in the family!
Laird
tony
6 Dec 2015Thanks for your kind words, Laird. It has been a nice way to relive our adventure but we’re pretty much done on the Antarctica posts so will be new adventures now. Some South Africa photos and NZ South Island and there will be some photos coming from New Zealand Subantarctic Islands later in the summer so there should be more penguins and hopefully albatrosses too. It will be a more basic and rougher expedition than NG Explorer but looking forward to seeing our remote islands that few get to visit. Hope you are both well and happy and enjoying new adventures too.