Tour de France Stage 5 Rouen to Saint Quentin Final

Full details about today’s image are below. First a tip about zoom blur in Topaz Lens Effects.

Tip of the Day

In Topaz choose Lens Effects and from the list on the left choose Lens Motion. There are 2 presets Zoom 1 the strongest and Zoom 2 less strong. For more control though use the Menu on the right. Motion type - Zoom and use the Motion Amount slider to get the right effect for the image. Click on Event Centre and then click on the picture at the point you want the zoom to be centred

The Shot

Last week I took the ferry from Newhaven to Dieppe to stay there 5 days and take in 2 stages of the Tour de France as it came through the area. This picture was taken about 20 miles east of Rouen. The rider in the centre is Mark Cavendish.

The picture was taken handheld with a Sony A700 with a Sigma 10-20 wide angle zoom at 10mm. I used ISO 400 to gain a high shutter speed of 1/650^th second. The image was opened in Camera Raw and 2 additional images were created at +2EV and -2Ev for a “false HDR” with each image having Noiseware Pro applied. A Photoshop action I had saved was used to create the extra images automatically. The images were saved as tiffs.

Photomatix

Outputted in Photomatix to detail enhancer. Click the Camera name top right on flickr for this image for Exif details and the settings used.

Photoshop

In Photoshop a zoom blur was applied using Topaz lens effects. A layer mask was used to fully or partly remove the blur from some cyclists.

The image was cropped to concentrate more on the Cyclists

General adjustments in levels to enhance contrast. Some areas excluded with a layer mask.

Brightness increased with a layer mask to exclude highlights.

Vibrance increased 20 points.

Layers flattened before going on to sharpening.

Duplicate layer Noiseware Pro and a little sharpening

BEFORE AND AFTER

Below are the Before and After images. First the original image. Then the tonemapped image and then the final result after zoom blur and adjustments.

Original at 0EV

Tour de France Stage 5 Rouen to Saint Quentin Original

Tonemapped image Detail Enhancer

Tour de France Stage 5 Rouen to Saint Quentin Tonemapped

Final Image

Tour de France Stage 5 Rouen to Saint Quentin Final

Edwin Jones