South Florida Fair in HDR at the South Florida Fairgrounds - West Palm Beach

The last time I was at the South Florida Fair was back in high school. How time flies! I would have never guessed back then that I would end up here as a photographer. But here I am, shooting photos with a local photography group. I really wanted to make this image fun. So I pushed the limits of my processing technique. Almost to the point where it becomes an illustration. In most cases heavy processing really detracts from the image but in this case I believe it works well. However I'm not to happy with the results from the sky. It's very blotchy because of the clouds. I could Photoshop it out but I'm not sure if this composition is worth all that time. What do you think?

Location: South Florida Fairgrounds, West Palm Beach, Florida

Camera Used: Canon 5D Mark1

Lens Used: Canon 17-35mm f/2.8L USM

Camera Settings: ISO 200, Aperture Priority, f/3.5 @ 1/50 of a second, AEB +2/0/-2, Image Shot in RAW

Processing Technique: HDR with 3 exposures merged using Photomatix. Topaz Adjust was used to enhance the details. Final HDR image processed in Photoshop CS4. Scroll to the bottom of this page to download original exposures and settings used to create this photo.

Processing Time: 2 hour

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