From second floor balcony of the Biltmore House
This shot of the moon was taken from the front of the house facing east just a few minutes after the landscape shot was taken from the back of the house, no clouds anywhere to the east at that time.
Two image focus stack, one of the tree limbs, one of the moon.
The top image was taken while on a self guided tour from the second floor west facing balcony of the famous Biltmore House in South Ashville in NC, and is the main attraction of the Biltmore Estate, the estate was built by George Vanderbilt before his marriage to Edith Dresser in 1898 , the house opened to family and friends in 1895 after 6 years of construction by ca 1,000 craftsmen.
Unfortunately, my timing was not as good as I had hoped, I was hoping for more dramatic light but the golden hour was too far off, I couldnāt wait till then as I was with family and I didnāt want to inconvenience them just for a better photo op.
One thing for me that makes this image interesting was the carriage rides, you can easily see the one near the LRC but thereās another one coming up the second hill in the center of the image (if you look close). I left the image full width so it could be viewed large enough.
Edit: I guess the file size was too large, NPN downsized the image to about 1/3 the original pixel size. I was still way under the 10MB limit. Well, It may be a little harder to see the āWhereās Waldoā carriage at this size
Another interesting thing for me was the use of a 90mm Macro Lens for landscape work.
The only parts not in focus seem to be the mountains but I guess I can blame the haze for that.
The communications towers on the peaks are still pretty focused IMHO.
I used that macro lens for close-up shots in the house, portraits of my family on the same balcony, then for this landscape shot.
Specific Feedback Requested
The mountains in the distance were from 5 miles to 18 miles away with some scattered clouds and haze but the trees and hills in the FG were only a few hundred feet away with āSevere Clearā skies.
The RAW file was pretty flat looking so I did the best I could to separate the hills and trees with masks in selected areas.
Is the overall appearance OK?
Did I overdo the saturation and separation layers?
Are the mid-range tones OK?
How do you feel about using a macro lens for landscape work?
Technical Details
A7R IV, 90mm Macro Lens, 1/125s, f8, ISO 125, Lr, Ps, Focus was aimed at trees on the second hill.
Near limit focus was at about 50 feet. Only cropped from the top about 2400 pixels vertically to remove unwanted sky for balance and to turn it into panoramic.
This is about the best landscape scene I can hope for until we do some traveling in the spring.
Thanks for looking