1/125 sec at F/8, 1600 ISO
@eweljim
Thanks for posting Jim and hope you continue on with your membership, lots of good photos by some interesting people with interesting tastes. I would call the image Purple Haze. The rowers and a good human interest to the lake shot and seem to be the major focus of the image but they are too far away. I like the tree ridge line silhouette. There is a lot of “noise” in the sky which would be expected at 1600 ISO but lots of processing tools can minimize it. You could try cropping up from the bottom to give more emphasis on the rowers. and darken them and go for a purple silhouetted image. Best to you.
Thanks Stephen. I’m finding that I have to make changes as I move from Street Photography to Landscapes, including all of the things you mention. I’m curious, which tool do you use to “denoise” images? I have one (Luminar) but it doesn’t seem to work well for eliminating noise. Jim
I have had good results with Lightroom, I use the brush tool, select the area, and push the noise slider to the right. Sorry Jim I am not familiar with Luminar. Also in Lightroom the detail tab can provide some help. But that brush tool is very easy.
Agree with @Stephen_Stanton regarding the crop and the noise. Looks like appropriate social distancing though 
.
I’ve taken images of rowing competitions for a year or two and really enjoyed it. These are pleasant scenes. The light is interesting and the color adds a sense of cold to the scene. The reflected light is nice, but quite a bit brighter than the sky, so this tends to disorient viewers looking for consistency with how we see the world. In other words, if there’s room to move on increasing the luminance of the sky, that might help too.
As for noise reduction, I too use the NR tool in LR, but depending on the goal of the image (for print, especially as an enlargement), this degree of noise is very difficult to eradicate, especially if there’s any detail in the noise (such as these ripples). The sky can tolerate a fairly heavy amount of NR, but the water will look pasty/smeary with the amount of NR necessary to remove it as a distraction. Other tools include “negative” clarity, “negative” detail, “negative” texture, or NR tools in Ps. There are of course 3rd party NR tools, such as Topaz DeNoise. Having tried multiple tools, I’ve concluded that at the end of the day, it’s all about balancing the amount of detail desired from the image, and your tolerance of noise reduction the image can handle. Coupled with the ultimate “goal” of the image (small digital image vs enlarged print) these variables (and lots of experimentation) can help shape your decision.
Thanks Jim. I think you’re right about the noise reduction: it’s a tradeoff.
