The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.
Description
The other day a friend and I went to shoot Lasalle Falls. Being high summer the flow wasn’t as great as it is in early spring with all the melt, but this river rages pretty good all year (the Pine). I’d been here a few years ago in fall, but somehow missed the trail to get to this view from the other side. It’s a very steep and rocky trail so you have to be sure of your footing when you come down. Once there, traversing the slabs of rock at the base of the small cliff is not too hard, but damn they are slippery after rain. Still, I had a great time with her and with this waterfall, looking for different views and trying different techniques.
Specific Feedback
I like the symmetry here and how the reflection in the foreground lines up with the falls in a continuous flow. I even like the light colored maple on the left since it breaks up some of the foliage. Does it unbalance things too much? Does the centered position of the falls work here? I have others where it is not centered as well, but I like this direct look, too, and think it suits B&W. How does the sharpness and texture look - enough of both?
Technical Details
Tripod and a couple of Freewell filters - Mist ND base & ND 32 CPL
Had the camera in monochrome preview and also used in-camera aspect ratio of 2:3
Exposure bracketing - 2/3 stop starting with a -1/3 of a stop underexposure (I think)
Started with a Linear Profile for 3 images with no adjustments then HDR blend in Lr
Used the B&W Blue Filter v2 Profile on the resulting DNG file
Lots of masking to massage tonalities and direct the eye
Some distraction removal and lens correction & transform
This has an interesting composition of a centered cross, which results in 4 quadrant elements, each in a corner. Somewhat like the panes in a window. One thing that came to mind is that I would like the white foam in the foreground to have the same tonality as the whitewater in the rapids. I’m not sure actually. The fg seems overly dark in general. It was probably like that.
Funny this didn’t strike me until you wrote that. Thanks for that. The shoreline is overhung with trees that reach out to the open space and you have to work under them over on this side, so it was kind of dim there. I brought up the exposure there, but not a lot so it would seem like you were looking out into light. Maybe it’s a bit much.
I like the foreground part of this image quite a lot. The detail is good and the balance between the water and the rocks works well.
But the falls in the background are a problem. They’re very bright so that draws my attention, but they don’t really have much detail. I’m not sure if that is because of shutter speed, or if they’re blown out. If they’re blown out you could try some high recovery.
In general, I’m not really sure what you want me to be concentrating on. Both the falls and the foreground could be subjects but there is such a brightness difference that they don’t connect for me.
Processing images like this can be difficult. I’ve been working on processing a cascade image in monochrome recently, and the range of brightness can be really hard to deal with
Thanks @WillR - sorry the through-line isn’t working for you, but that’s ok. I have some others with different compositions that might. And I think color may help rather than b&w which can be more difficult to connect with, too.
I like the symmetry and balance in this, too. I do wish there was a bit more detail in the falls, but overall I like the swirling feel to the water. It contrasts with the solid feel of the rocks.
I like the rocks right there in the FG. They give this a different feeling than a usual waterfall image.
I like the texture, and that light-colored tree works fine for me.
You know what? I just zoomed in to look at those rocks, and I liked how this looks when you really crop it. Crop it to take out the sky on top. I think my favorite thing in this is that pile of rocks in front!
