A February Afternoon

[John_Kilgour]

Critique Style Requested: Standard

The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.

Description

My wife and I spent a day last weekend cross-country skiing in the area around this meadow and peak. We passed by the meadow once around noon and then again later in the day on our way back to the car. I took this shot on our return trip late in the afternoon, when the sun was pretty low in the sky. The peak in this image isn’t especially high (there are much higher ones not far from here), but I think its distinctive shape and treeless summit make for a good subject. I also really liked the texture on the snow in the foreground. In retrospect, I wish I had tried getting lower to make the surface of the snow a little more prominent in the image.

Specific Feedback

The main things I tried to address with my processing were the sky and the snow-covered meadow. In the unedited version, the sky is quite bright, so I worked on toning it down and bringing out some of the detail in the clouds. The meadow was a bit dark—not fully in the shade yet, but heading that way—so I brightened it a little to try to achieve a more balanced look between sky, mountain, and meadow. Any feedback/suggestions on the processing—or anything else—are definitely welcome.

Technical Details

44 mm, 1/125 sec, f/11, ISO 125.

[John_Williams]

Love the pristine feel of the image John. This looks like it was a great plac to be out enjoying some snow time!

@John_Kilgour

In retrospect, I wish I had tried getting lower to make the surface of the snow a little more prominent in the image.

I think I see where you are heading here. The snow, as is, is a pretty large empty space in comparison to the interest of the middle and sky. Another option might have been to ski over closer to that red vegetation and try and get it to be a larger part of the image; there is nice color in that winter bark.

One other thought is that this seems pretty bright given the shadows and your comment about where the sun was. I could see increasing the contrast by dropping the luminosity of the sky and snow; that might add to the “later in the day” feel of the image.

Here’s a quick example of what I am trying to mean:

[John_Kilgour]

Thank you @John_Williams for the comments and suggestions. I like what you’ve done with your edits and will spend some time playing around with that idea. You definitely brought out more of the texture in the snow. I did try a few other shots to the left of where I took this one. There’s more of the vegetation in them, but I felt like I couldn’t find a composition that worked very well. I think there’s definitely opportunity for more images here though. Not sure if I’ll make it back to this area this winter, but I hope to get back to it sometime soon. Thanks again for your feedback!