‘The Baker’ was taken in San Francisco, looking through the window of the Boundin Bakery on Fisherman’s Wharf (see the original image). I took several shots of him working and thought that this one had the best overall composition for the square format I wanted to use.
Post capture treatment used Nik Darken / Lighten centre, Glamour Glow and Photoshop Hue and Saturation to start to get the feeling I wanted. Nik Paper Toner, Detail Extractor and Viveza were then used followed by a texture layer of part of a rendered wall I took at a flower show. Various clone and Viveza layers were then used to remove minor distractions and to adjust the lighting until it all looked the way I wanted it to. In many cases, layer masks were used so that the effect only showed on part of the image. Finally, it was sharpened using high pass filter.
It has had 25 international acceptances including: 121st Toronto International Salon of Photography (2014, Canada), 5th Luxembourg Digital Contest (2014, Luxembourg), 24th Tallaght International Salon of Photographic Art (2014, Ireland), 69th Bristol Salon of Photography (2015, England), 96th Scottish International Salon of Photography (2019, Scotland) and 2nd Zhuhai International Exhibition of Photography 2019 (China) . It has been awarded the Alan Porrett Judge’s Medal at the 35th Northern Counties International Salon of Photography 2014, (England), a FIAP Ribbon at the 10th Swansea International Salon (2014, Wales), a Judges Award at the Solway Salon in the Great British Small Print Circuit (2015, UK), Photographic Society of America Honourable Mention at the 1st Circular Exhibition of Photography “SBM Circuit” (2015, Podgorica – Montenegro) and a NCPF Ribbon at the 41st Smethwick International Exhibition (2015, England).
Nikon D800, 28 mm Nikkor prime lens, ISO 200, f/1.8, 1/1600 sec.
