Edit
Critique Style Requested: Standard
The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.
I was drawn to the textures and light, and the illusion of torsos or legs.
Do you see the leg/torso illusion too? Is it too saturated? Is there too much of a pink cast in the middle ground?
As always, any/all comments much appreciated, thanks.
Canon EOS RP + EF100-400 @285 mm
0.3s, f/16, ISO100
I love the lines, texture, as well as the subtle tones of the foreground, is this natural hill or something human made? The narrow band along the top edge doesnāt entirely work for me, Iād prefer to see more of it (or perhaps not at all). The middle ground is quite close in colour and brightness to the foreground, an adjustment of the hue migh help, but even just a bit more contrast, eithe overall, or in that earea, should help to separate it. But I imagine there is an interesting abstract image somewhere in the foreground area, might be worth exploring.
Hi Cathy!
What a great view! Utah?
I love the striated patterns within those orange rocks. I think the saturation looks great - Iām pretty sure that is what you were seeing. The color and visually interesting patterns really draw me in. Have you discovered the work of Guy Tal?
I agree with most of the comments of @Tomas_Frydrych. I think you could add a bit of contrast in the nearby rock patterns to emphasize those interesting patterns even more. I might even like a bit more blue or purple in the near shadows to create an interesting color play between the orange and blue.
I donāt see that much value of the middle distance or far distance. Maybe cropping some of that away would help.
Two other things bother me just a bit. The overall composition just rolls downhill. There is nothing to stop the eye in the right side of the frame. If you did opt for a crop, I think you could also rotate it counter-clockwise to combat that. Pure speculation.
Lastly, I wish this was a bit sharper. You shot this with a long lens, and I think your shutter may have been too slow - tripod or not. Sharpness is something I have battled in similar focal lengths, and speeding up the shutter has helped. If there is no wind, maybe you can get away with that longer shutter speed on a tripod, but then you may want to turn IBIS off.
Please take all my comments with a dash of salt!
Best - Bill
Tomas, thank you for your comments! This is an entirely natural scene in the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah.
I struggled with that horizontal band at the top! Glad you mentioned it. I kept it in this version because I didnāt want to crop the rock formation to loose the torso feel. But with your feedback, Iāll revisit that decision as well as the middle ground value and contrast. Oh, and I love that foreground too! I have some abstract shots of the textures and patterns that I havenāt processed yet. (Day job slows my photography progress!)
Hi Bill,
Thank you for your comments! Yes, itās an image from my trip in December to the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah. And yes again! Guy Tal is a huge inspiration for me and especially on this trip to his backyard when I also happened to be reading one of his books.
Iāll work on the middle ground color/contrast and some alternative crops this weekend. Thanks for pointing out the lack of sharpness and slow shutter speed. Argh. It was a bit breezy. I guess Iāll just have to go back and try again 
Wonderful find! I think you have some artistic possibilities worth playing with. For me, the far BG isnāt contributing. Cropping it wonāt damage the compositional torso idea. A little graduated burn from UL and LR corners can help keep the eye in the frame. And I had to play with blurring and lowering saturation on the BG.
Looks like sharpness was a bit soft but you could likely give it a visual boost with the Texture slider in raw conversion. 0.3s is thin ice ā you could probably get away with a much higher ISO (todayās NR is mind-boggling). At that low a SS, using the timer delay or a remote release is mandatory. And electronic first-curtain shutter can be important to prevent vibration from mirror slap with mechanical shutter, which can be a factor unless you have a rock-solid tripod and head.
Diane, thanks for the edit! You and @Tomas_Frydrych are right about the crop of the far distance, looks better and doesnāt cut the torso too much. And your blur idea is super cool and kinda funny in the way it suggests a totally different scale (close up of a butt on a beach!). I would not have thought of that! Thanks for the lesson!
Iāll mess around with texture etc to try make it look sharper in the foreground. I did use a timer delay for this (2 s), and itās a mirrorless camera. As far as rock solid tripod, mineās closer to soft sandstone than granite for sure 
Youāre welcome! Hanging a heavy weight from a tripod can help with stability. I have a heavy camera bag that works well, but if Iām not carrying it (and Iām thinking), Iāll bring a stuff bag and plan on being able to pick up a couple of sturdy rocks.
And old habits die hard ā I meant to say shutter slap instead of mirror slap. Iāve never seen information that the shutter could shake a slow exposure but it is a moving part, so I use electronic or EFC shutter, just in case. Tripods, heads and attachment hardware have the potential to become moving parts, too.
Would you recommend a longer delay to wait for all the moving parts to settle down? My camera has 2 s and 10 s. I can definitely see vibrations (when I touch it for example) but to my eye they stop by 2s. But my snowflake sensor might be more sensitive than my eye.
I always use 2s if I donāt have the release, but thatās with a sturdy tripod. If I had any doubts, 10 is better than 2. If I had a center column extended it would definitely feel safer.
Hi Cathy! I like this image of orange legs and torso. 
I like the near hillside and itās texture. I also donāt think it is too saturated. I agree with many of the comments above and like Dianeās edit. It makes for a stronger image.
With respect to the shutter delay and shutter speed, the shutter delay helps. There are a couple of factors. The most significant one is magnification from that longer lens. Even the moving air is going to introduce softness - so most recommendations for shutter speeds are at 1/focal-length. So - at 100mm, you would need 1/100 sec. At the 285mm this was shot at, you would need 1/285 - assuming nothing else is moving. Lens and IBIS stabilization can help a great deal and will reduce that number - but you will have to experiment with that.
The other issue I have encountered is blur created by stabilization. I have run into this in my astro attempts. On a tripod, you typically want to turn off your cameraās stabilization - though that is not related to the focal length issue.
I think you will need to figure this out with your particular setup - but I would encourage you to try multiple shutter speeds when time allows. I have found that modern mirrorless cameras are pretty forgiving with higher ISOs in relation to noise, as long as you donāt underexpose too much. And, when there is a bit of noise, Lightroom has an amazing AI tool to remove it.
Thanks for your comments Bill! Iāve been pretty religious about the 1/focal length rule when handholding, but I thought that was overkill on a tripod (with stabilization turned off). I have tried to just use the base ISO, but sounds like I should allow that to be higher.
Diane, if 0.3 s is thin ice, what SS would you consider safe to āwalk onā (to continue the ice metaphor)?
Anyhow, edit posted. I may have gone overboard with the color now, whaddaya think?
I like the edit. Iād consider lowering saturation on blues.
@Bill_Lathrop covered it very well! (Think about movement across the single photosites on the sensor. ) Another tripod stability thing is to make sure the legs are stretched out tightly ā that makes a big difference and is often overlooked. The tripod isnāt just to carry the weight of the camera. But base ISO is far from the most important consideration, with todayās NR. The loss of dynamic range at high ISO is also a consideration, but noise is way easier to fix than blur.
No way to make a good recommendation but more like 1/100 sec feels reasonable with the 100-400 ā maybe 1/200 at 400mm. I just shot a perched bird (will post later today) at 1000mm and 1/160 sec that was about as sharp as I could expect with a 2X. I was wide open at f/14 and ISO 1600, in cloudy light. In some frames there was blur, probably from the bird moving a little, but most were sharp.
And a thumbs up for Billās mention of stabilization blur ā I doubt you would see it with the rig you used here but if I try to shoot something still at 1000mm but in very dim light, thus SSs of maybe 1/2 to 1 sec, if I have stabilization on I will see the subject slightly swimming in the frame. I havenāt tested to see what the SS limit is ā I just turn it off with the lens and that turns off in-body stabilization with my camera. But thatās basically a night photography concern.
Suspending a bag from a tripod works well, as long as itās not too windy. I find that if itās windy enough to start swinging the bag, the movement feeds back into the tripod. I now carry about a 3m of paracord in my camera bag that I tie to rocks on the ground, or, fill a stuff sack, but the sack must rest on the ground. The paracord has just the right degree of elasticity to be able to tension it enough not to go slack when tiyng the knots. I find this setup provides adequate stability even for long exposures in strong winds.
The one other thing Iād say is tripod is the one piece of kit that is not worth saving money on. Itās not only a question of rigidity, but also how quickly the tripod settles when it shakes. The dampening is what sets the expensive tripods apart. IIRC, DPReview did some quantitative tests on this a year or two back.
Excellent points, @Tomas_Frydrych! And back to the tripod head, thatās also worth an up-front investment instead of an upgrade after finding out the first one wasnāt very good. An Arca-Swiss style levered clamp is wonderful, with an adapter firmly connected to the camera body. There may be less expensive ones but these are top-notch. A downside is that they are contoured to the camera body for a firm attachment and your next body will probably need a new one. But I see there is now a universal one. The L-bracket idea is wonderful for going to portrait orientation. Flipping the head over is not very practical for many rigs.
Great ideas here! Thank you @Tomas_Frydrych @Bill_Lathrop @Diane_Miller ! Here are some faves.
Started doing this on my outing yesterday!
Good point!
How to build a bomber belay anchor for your tripod!
How do you balance the trade-off between weight and stability for long hikes?
Thanks!
I can claim some experience in balancing weight and stability, being one of those 3/4 scale people at 5 ft and 120 lb (20 of which is baggage) and my age is one of those unlisted number things. Letās just say I donāt hike very far or very fast.
There are a lot of sturdy lightweight tripods but the best are not cheap. Carbon fiber is mandatory. I have one of the lightest ones with 4 leg sections from Really Right Stuff and love it, and @Kris_Smith has the same one. It seems to have been replaced in their line and a quick look at their web site frustratingly doesnāt show much comparison of their various models. But handled with care it is very sturdy and stable. But Iād bet there are cheaper alternatives that are 99.9% as good.
I have a FlexShooter head for it which is very nice, but only consider the lever clamp model. I like that you level the base and then can move the camera up/dn or side to side without tilting it. With a telephoto lens with a tripod foot, you loosen a ring to rotate the lens+camera and of you do that while a ball head is loose you suddenly need 3 hands. Again, there are similar alternatives.
I really could get by with this rig, but I already had a bigger RRS tripod and a Wimberley gimbal head for a ludicrously big and heavy 600mm f/4 lens, but it is now obsolete. With my CanonR5 and 100-500 lens + 2X, I have 1000mm or less at just a few pounds and the small rig is fine, although I appreciate the bigger one if Iām not walking far.
I use a Large Format camera so thatās sort of became non issue, I have to live the ~12kg of it all, which mostly means more planning, taking it slow, and just day outings. But before I switched over to LF, I bought a Gitzo Mountaineer 1 tripod, which is under 1.5kg including the ball head. The price was silly, and I was dithering about it, but it turned out one of the best photography investments I have made, it can even cope with a ālightweightā LF camera (about 2kg with the lens), if itās not too windy and the bottom sections are not used. That is, tripod doesnāt have to be stupidly heavy to be stable, it needs to be approriate to the weight of the camera and there is a sort of weight - stability - price triangle, you can prioritize any two of those. There are other decent brands than Gitzo, possibly better, but from what I have seen the price tags for similar quality seem similar.
Also, note that instability comes from the head as much as the tripod. On the Mounteer 1, the stalk of the ball head is the weakest point, without the head the tripod can cope acceptably with 5kg of camera, but itās total pain adjusting the camera position (in the image linked above the head is āafter marketā, very old Linhof LF leveling head from ebay, which happens to be lighter than the original Gitzo head, and much lighter than similar contemporary models (under 300g). This sort of a design that eliminates the stack above the ball is much more stable, but has more limited range (less of an issue for LF camera). This is a much bigger camera on the original head, you can just about see the stalk ā this setup is not good enough for the 5kg load.
This here is the string setup in action, it has the added advantage of preventing the tripod from falling over, which I have had to happen a couple of times in the past.
