Blue Hour At Point Lobos

Image Critiques Landscape Critiques
1

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Critique Style Requested: Standard

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

Description

Hello friends, my girlfriend took me to Point Lobos for my birthday last weekend and I captured this shot during the blue hour.

Point Lobos has quickly become one of my favorite spots on the California coast – I can’t believe I’d never been there before despite spending quite a bit of time in Monterey/Carmel!

Specific Feedback

For this image I wanted to emphasize a sense of depth and to depict the scene with a soft, painterly, and slightly ethereal aesthetic. I would have really liked to use a longer exposure (this is 5s), but by the time I got around to that the last of the golden sunlight reflecting from some clouds to the left was gone.

Really I think this photo might have worked better if I had captured it just as the sun was setting, but I was too entranced by taking bird photos. :slight_smile:

Any feedback is welcome, but especially:

  1. How can I improve the sense of depth? In hindsight, I think working a bit to find a vertical composition lower to the ground with the wide angle lens could have helped. I’m unsure how well I emphasized depth with my post-processing – I tried to make sure there was more contrast in the foreground than the background.
  2. How can I further achieve a soft/painterly aesthetic? I think taking this photo just as the sun was setting could have provided more interesting light. I also wonder how effective it was to raise the blacks the further back in the image you go.

Technical Details

Camera: Sony a6600
Settings: 5s, f/13, ISO 160
Lens: Sigma 16mm f/1.4
Special techniques: long exposure
Processing: masking to darken foreground and soften mid/background

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2

I’m partial to sunset seascapes myself, but looking at the marine layer sitting out there in this image was it an option? All to often I’ve been at the coast hoping for that last gasp of late light, only to have that layer turn off the light a little too soon.

I think you did well with your goal of depth and ethereal. The image has a great flow from the lrc to the ulc for depth. The soft water texture helps with the ethereal, as does the late light even if it wasn’t at sunset.

One image that would be interesting to compare would be a very late light image from here. I find that a long exposure a little before deep night develops can have some interesting colors, and it would give an even more ethereal texture to the water.

1 Like
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Hi John, thanks for the feedback! Yeah you’re right about the marine layer, guess I’ll just have to go back and try again! I have another photo which was taken later and with a longer exposure which I edited BNW. I really like the mistiness the longer (30s) exposure gives it, but the golden light from the sunset was killed so I went BNW.

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I will have to go back and try again sometime soon! Thanks for the recommendation.

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4

The water does look good!