Returning to life [explored on 2022/05/21]

I was back to the little enchanted world of the meanders of the river Adda, downstream the Lake Como - my little secret garden. A deep peace pulsed around me, a striking variety of bird calls interweaving with each other to compose a rich living tapestry, a symphony unfolding over the low murmurs of the lazy waters.

We have been experiencing a severe drought for the last months, the major Italian rivers reduced to thin, shallow streams snaking along gravel banks. The rivers are revealing long hidden mementos of the last war and even fossilised skeletons of ancient animals living in the Padan plain when it was a swampy savannah.
I have tread on places usually covered with water, nonetheless the river is still able to show its beauty in this specific location.
The sky was still unnervingly cloudless, as it always is lately, yet there was a beautiful, golden light - and the trees were wearing their springy, festive dress, encrusted with amazingly coloured filigrees of budding leaves.

There is a thriving flock of YouTube tutorials sporting titles of the "don't use wide-angle for landscape" kind and yes, I use wide-angle, but I sometimes enjoy to zoom into my landscape, exploring it, looking for some little world nestled within the scene - something that is always there, but usually gets lost in the rich vastness of a wide-angle view. This is one of those occasions. When I zoomed on the opposite bank, I discovered a rich tapestry of trunks and branches, and sparkling budding leaves. The sunlight pouring from the hilltops played all through the scene and, for a fleeting moment, I was able to feel the delicate yet powerful footsteps of the approaching Goddess, flowers blooming in her footprints and flowery scents diffusing in the air at her dance.
(if you are wondering about what kind of substance I might had assumed, please, go and read the beautiful proem of Lucretius' De Rerum Natura)

Explored on 2022/05/21 nr. 44

Exactly at the point where I usually consider my processing workflow finished, I stared at the picture, wondering what was lacking. Yes, an undefined "something" was definitely lacking, and it was something that one would usually call a defect. So I blended on top of the tower a layer with the +2.0 ev shot, I blurred it a lot, and I set the "soft light" blending mode. Nice, at least after applying a layer mask that was a grayscale version of the picture and tweaking it to exclude the water in the foreground. But something was still lacking. At last I duplicated that overexposed and blurred layer and used it to add a soft bloom in the top left corner, whence that golden light poured onto the river and its valley. That was it. I hope that you enjoy the picture and its springy feeling!

I have processed this picture by blending an exposure bracketing [-2.0/-1.0/0/+1.0/+2.0 EV] by luminosity masks with the Gimp (EXIF data, as usual, refer to the "normal" exposure shot), then I added some final touches with Nik Color Efex Pro 4.
Along the journey I tried the inverted RGB blue channel technique described by Boris Hajdukovic to give a slight tonal boost to the whole scene, excluding the lazy waters in the foreground. As usual, I gave the finishing touches with Nik Color Efex Pro 4.
Raw files processed with Darktable.

Taken in: Italy / Lombardy / Olginate / Fornasetta Superiore (show map)

Taken on: April 10, 2022

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Italia

Italy

Adda

fiume

river

meanders

wetlands

zona umida

autumn

fall

autunno

alba

early morning

sunrise

daybreak

dawn

golden light

golden hour

Hills

Woods

bloom

leaves

colours

colourful

palette

foliage

water

mist

vapour

fog

ghosts

silence

quiet

light and shadows

pioppi

salici

poplars

willows

hillsides

colline

glowing light

shining

spark

glow

Nikon

D750

the Gimp

Darktable

luminosity masks

24 mm

wideangle

zoom

calm

peace

tranquillity

serenity

pace

serenità

Nikkor

24-120 mm

color efex pro 4

fleeting

trunks

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Sets appears in: • Explored photos • Silent banks more » • Sunrise « less

Groups appears in: • Landscape • 300+ Faves 1-2-3 (Post one,Comment and Fave two) more » • Golden Landscape, Only The Best ! (Post 1, Comment 1) • Scenic Splendor • NIKON D750/D780 CLUB • ! FavTop Master 300+ (P1, A+F4) • 300+ Favorites - Post 1, Comment & Fave 2 • ! Beautiful and great captures • **Special Landscapes** « less

Camera: Nikon D750, f/18.0, 1/15 sec, 105mm, ISO 100 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Nikon D750
Aperture:	f/18.0
Exposure Time:	0.067 sec (1/15)
Focal Length:	105mm
ISO:	100
Exposure Bias:	0 EV
Flash:	Off, Did not fire
Exposure Program:	Aperture-priority AE
Exposure Mode:	Auto
Metering Mode:	Multi-segment
White Balance:	Auto
Color Space:	Uncalibrated
Software:	GIMP 2.10.24
Show full info

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