This image was taken first thing in the morning as I waited for the sun to crest the hills to the east. As I waited, I noticed that the very top of the tree and the tips of some of the foreground shrubs were getting kissed. This was another image from my fall trip to Utah.
Specific Feedback Requested
Just wondering if I should tighten the crop up on both the right and left side of the image to solely focus in on the main tree or not.
I also cooled down this image and am wondering if the white balance is too cool.
Thanks for taking a look.
Technical Details
Is this a composite: No
Nikon D850, 1/200 @f/8, ISO 100, 150-600mm lens shot at 150mm.
Great photo. I would not crop…the composition looks great to me. My little suggestions would be to desaturate the deep orange at the right edge because it draws the eye, and consider desaturating the row of growth at the bottom, for the same reason.
Excellent. Before reading any of the comments, I was going to suggest exactly what @Tony_Siciliano recommended, so I second his thoughts. Otherwise, the processing looks spot on. A very enjoyable image.
I love this exact moment, too, David, when the sun kisses the top of trees. I think you have captured it well. No nit from me, I am not affected by the orange at the edge at all actually.
Crop looks just right to me. Any tighter and it would feel odd. I am not overly bothered by the orange tree on the right, but if you want to experiment you could do a few things to lessen the effect - raise the luminance on the oranges over there with a radial mask, paint color from the trees on the left onto the dark tree using the color clone action in the TK8 panel or use frequency separation to do the same thing. The grasses do steal the show somewhat so maybe just lower the exposure there with some burning or a linear gradient.
It’s a gorgeous tree and the shape is so uniform. Very much worth getting up early and setting up. The cliff and scree in the background really helps to isolate it in a way that it needs to be this dramatic. The colors look natural to me in terms of white balance and saturation/contrast. This kind of low, indirect, but relatively bright light looks like that and the cooler background isn’t too blue or weird looking. The greens look right, too.
You could touch the parts of the trees where the sun is hitting with a brush of luminance to open the yellow channel in just those areas. It would add some contour and make the effect you saw with your eyes come through more in the photo. Fun to experiment anyway. This is a wall hanger for sure.
You seem to have a knack for taking these cottonwood in canyon images. The colors in those walls offset the tree nicely. In fact, that’s the biggest reason I would not crop. The impact of the walls would be diminished. I get the sense that this is an early morning shot from the grass but not from the tree itself that much. Usually the colors in the shade are more faded than those in color but that doesn’t seem to be the case here. The bright grass at the bottom of the frame I would clone out.
David,
For my tastes you have already framed this perfectly. The tree is obviously the star and I think the cooler tones in the BG canyon wall helps with that so I wouldn’t crop any of it off. That first bit of light is always so enchanting and you have nailed it with the tree and FG grasses. This is being nit picky, but my thought is the same as @Igor_Doncov about cloning out that one bit patch of grass along the bottom edge. Beautifully done!
The crop looks good to me. I’m not bothered by the brighter oranges, but when you have an image this good, there could be many versions. The beauty of digital. The tree is the star against the rather plain background.
