This is two different versions of the same image. I shot it in color, but intended to make it black and white. I'm not, however; feeling satisfied with my b/w edit. If anyone has any advice to give, I'd be very appreciative.
Edit: Added third version.
What if you built up an atmosphere?
Just "thinking out-loud" here of course. I added a textured background, scratches for "snow" and brought it a little bit further into "high key", brought back some of the detail in the blacks and added a pinch of atmosphere "glow". Just my thoughts nothing more.
Thank you for taking the time to work on this. I like the high-key effect there. It looks good.
I think I'll avoid the texture. Even though it looks natural enough, it makes the shot a little less minimalistic to my eyes. I was trying to make him seem isolated, which this somehow messes with.
No worries at all; just tossing ideas around :)
Here's what I came up with.
yeah I feel the high key helps, def.
You can post this edit (or anything you like) on the left, Matthew, as the author here, so we can scroll between your images directly.
Bearing in mind what your stated aim was, I thought of increasing the contrast above the snow line, so you can still see texture low down, but making the figure more stark. I've done it a bit crudely with a linear gradient, but I hope it conveys the idea.