When I captured this image, I dialed in -1 EV as my intent was to keep everything but the brightest yellow trees dark. Too dark? I did bring the darkest areas down a bit more in post.
What artistic feedback would you like if any?
Composition: I chose to put the water “horizon” in the middle of the frame in the final crop (slight crop from the top). Seem appropriate to me. Does it work OK.
Any pertinent technical details:
Olympus EM-1 Mark II, 12-40 f/2.8 lens at 15mm.
1/160 @ f/3.2, ISO 64.
This image was captured using the high resolution pixel shift technology. 80mp RAW capture (10368 x 7776 pixel dimensions). This jpeg version doesn’t really do justice to the real detail in the image.
Keith, a wonderful fall scene. The timing on the light here works very nicely.
In response to your tech feedback I find the overall brightness just about right for my liking. I do not like over intensity when reviewing any images. I do really like bright scenes or scenes that provide highlight areas, but not ones that start to hurt your eyes when viewing them. The darkened trees work just fine at that given or finished level IMO.
The second point on water location is excellent from my POV. I like that the water area covers the entire reflection of the highlight area in the trees and does not crop off the tops here. …
Keith, the yellow to dark contrast seems to work well for me, but maybe as an option bringing out some details in the darker greens. Often a 50/50 horizon framing is a little static, but I suspect you cropped from the top for a good reason. And you made a good decision to keep the reflected yellows complete in the comp. Interesting you mentioned the high res option. I’ve been meaning to try that with my EM-1.
Keith I like the composition here a lot, it’s a mirror image, but it is off-center, which works well. I also like how you chose to include a good portion the mix of green and yellow aspens around the lake, it adds some contrast. I agree with Dan and Igor on dropping exposure in the very bright yellows. The exposure in the reflections looks good though. Sunlit yellows like this can be so tough to tame sometimes, this one is close to being okay, but I’d drop it a little.
@Ed_McGuirk@Igor_Doncov@Dan_Kearl@Bill_Leggett@Paul_Breitkreuz Thank you for your feedback. Here’s an updated version that I brought down the luminance of the yellow trees (but not the reflection). I had already worked them but after re-visiting the image, they were still bright.
