More Underground Cave Awesomeness (AuroraHDR, Graphic Novel filter)

It looks like some kind of calcified, underground dome. The tour guide did say that there were certain items that had been left in the cave for the specific purpose of calcification. The dome, of course, wasn't one of them... Thanks for stopping by (and putting up with my corny jokes)! 

Formation Inside a Cave (AuroraHDR, Graphic Novel filter)

Today's pictures in reverse order: The colorized graphic novel filter, the bw graphic novel filter, and the Photoshop edited original, cropped in Paintshop, processed for HDR in AuroraHDR. I do have to say that the original image was awfully dark, as seen below.

The crop removed the head of another tourist (which became visible as the image was processed in HDR). Of the three processed images above, I like the BW Graphic Novel filter the best.

Thanks for stopping by and for looking at my pictures! :)

Tight Quarters (AuroraHDR)

The floor and the ceiling slope together, with the space in between diminishing. And I - I think I'd rather be above ground. Not a particular fan of tight quarters. Thanks for stopping by!

More Cave Awesomeness (AuroraHDR, Graphic Novel filter)

Here is some more underground cave awesomeness from my recent trip of a few months ago on a tour through some underground caves. Thanks for stopping by!

Another Underground Cave Scene (AuroraHDR, Graphic Novel filter)

Here is another underground cave scene, processed for HDR with AuroraHDR, and then processed with Photoshop for the Graphic Novel filter (BW), and then the third image is the result of layering the first two images together. Thanks for stopping by!

Color Flooded Underground

Today's photo proved to be quite a challenge, because, as the title says it, the subject was color flooded. Down in a cave, the only lighting was unnatural, and the cave tour company decided to use gels to flood this area with a particular color. (Actually, they switched gels several times so that there were different colors.) Here is the image that I originally produced:

As you can see, the image is dark and flooded with a mostly pink-purple hue.

When I tried to process it in AuroraHDR, the presets produced... an interesting variety of colors in the image.

Since this wasn't quite what I was looking for, I went back to the drawing board and uploaded my image in Photomatix, with the following result:

Admittedly, I've been working with Photomatix longer than AuroraHDR and am a little bit more... comfortable working in that program (due to familiarity,) but I really like the Photomatix image much better than my AuroraHDR image.

I also processed the image with the Graphic Novel filter (because that's what I like to do) -

And merging together the AuroraHDR and the Photomatix HDR (and doing a little bit of Photoshop editing), I think that this is probably what the color of the cave would have looked like without the gel lights. Thanks for stopping by!

Green Underground (AuroraHDR)

If I remember the tour from a few weeks back, the green growth was a result of the light. The cave touring company tried to limit the amount of light that the caves get with lights that only are turned on while touring groups are in the caves.

The Bishop in the Corner (AuroraHDR)

On the tour of the caves, the tour guide said that the stalagmite in the corner was affectionately referred to as "the bishop". This was the faraway view for which he wanted us to guess the stalagmite's height. Later in the tour, he took us by the bishop close up and said, "Now, can anyone find the bishop?" Thanks for stopping by and for looking at my pictures! :)

More Underground Cave Craziness (AuroraHDR)

The craziness part is mostly that I was underground taking these pictures in the first place. Thanks for stopping by and looking at my pictures! :)

It's Bacon! (Aurora HDR)

The tour guide described this striped formation as the "bacon" formation. There were longer strips of bacon, but I liked this one. 

Stalagmites (Aurora HDR)

Shooting this picture (and others that will follow) was a challenge, because I was underground (no natural light) and didn't have a tripod (so, everything was handheld). This group of stalagmites was one of my first in the underground series, so... I hope you enjoy. Thanks for stopping by!