April Squares: Bright Spots

For the April Squares challenge this month, Becky has chosen the theme “Bright”. My entries this month will all be called Bright Spots. My photos in this series are selected from a project I am currently working on. I have received a digital photo frame as a gift, and I have been going through my archives for photos to include. What fun it has been to do that, a bright spot in my life for sure. I’ll include a bit about each photo entry. Here is today’s entry:

This original file was taken in Zion National Park several years ago at sunrise.

ISO 800 f/16 70mm 1/800sec

The first edit included a crop and using the erase tool to take care of some visible dust spots:

ISO 800 f/16 70mm 1/800sec

Another first edit was to change the camera profile. Here is a screen shot of where that change can be made in Luminar AI:

This shows camera profiles

The check indicates that it was set to Luminar Default, but I switched it to Camera Landscape which gave the colors a bit more of a rich feel. I also created a layer mask and have increase the exposure and shadows in the foreground only. I think it is important to note that I set that mask to 20% opacity in the mid-ground and 50% in the closest part of the image. I’m attempting to bring back some but not all detail. The focus of this photo is really intended to be that sunburst.

I really also wanted to create a square version as I think this scene is well suited to that:

ISO 800 f/16 70mm 1/800sec

I’m having a bit of fun with the color here as well by adding a LUT called, Analog look 5, which is basically a film filter.

I like these various edits, but each for a different reason. Your thoughts and comments are welcome below.

Cheers!

Added to Day 27 of April Squares.