I was concentrating mostly on capturing the wave action that appealed to me, and this is the one of the series I chose. I like the delicate foreground patterns on the black sand and the detail in the iceberg. But I’m concerned that the composition leaves a bit to be desired, particularly where the bergs cross the horizon line.
Any and all comments are welcome.
Hey Chris, I like the balance and arrangement of the bergs here - you’ve created some nice symmetry with your composition!
However, you’re exactly right that the bergs crossing the horizon line (or just barely doing so, rather) is an issue for the composition. I’m not sure that can really be worked around in post - I’d prefer to see the bergs completely below the horizon line with some breathing room, or very purposely above it, with their forms against the sky.
You could try darkening the sky significantly in order for it to act more like the shore and the ocean (a dark backdrop for the light blue bergs). The thing is, this could be tough to pull off convincingly in color, and in black and white it would be harder to separate the ice from the foamy water. I would give it a shot myself, except I don’t think editing a jpeg would allow for such a drastic adjustment to be done cleanly, you’d need to use the raw.
So as it stands, I think the best things you can do are to darken the sky and lighten the bergs, so as to separate them better, and to try playing with your white balance and tint (pushing them cooler and more magenta, respectively), as the whole image feels a little yellow/warm and greenish-cyan to me. In all honesty, I would hope that you tried some more compositions of these beautiful bergs, because I’m not sure this particular one will ever fully work with the unfortunate horizon distraction.
I also think longer shutter speeds could help simplify the water, as it is a bit busy as-is. You may need an ND filter to achieve that in this kind of light, though.
Alex,
Thanks for the extensive comment. I will try darkening the sky.
I didn’t use the ND filter because I wanted to preserve the pattern of the water on the beach. But there is probably a good compromise between that and softening the wave action.
Chris
Yes, I think everything looks much better in this version, including the water movement! I still wish the bergs weren’t nearly skirting the horizon, but there’s not much you can do about that at this stage. This is still a big improvement! I would try darkening the foamy water a bit on the left half of the frame, though - it’s drawing a bit too much attention away from the bergs.
