Please share your immediate response to the image before reading the photographer’s intent (obscured text below) or other comments. The photographer seeks a genuinely unbiased first impression.
Questions to guide your feedback
For this rendition, I left just a hit in the shadows to provide context and interest. Did it work?
Other Information
Please leave your feedback before viewing the blurred information below, once you have replied, click to reveal the text and see if your assessment aligns with the photographer. Remember, this if for their benefit to learn what your unbiased reaction is.
Image Description
These backlit trees were taken in Mt. Rainier National Park well after sunrise looking east on a ridgeline filled with trees.
Technical Details
ISO 100, 400mm, f/7.1, 1/250s
Specific Feedback
Aesthetic feedback is welcome =)
Critique Template
Use of the template is optional, but it can help spark ideas.
WOW!! The hint of detail in the shadows is the icing on the cake, and the cake is delicious! The composition is so engaging with the peaks of the trees echoed by their collective shapes making a peak. I think this is fantastic – it grabbed me at first glance and won’t let go!!
I love this picture.
This mix of backlight and silhouette works very well.
considering that I’m very fond of nitpicking, if it were my photo I would have either cloned out or darkened the lowest tree of them all.
Matt, this is a striking view with the strongly silhouetted trees placed well in the frame and nicely shaped. The subtlety of the non-lit trees is a fine viewing challenge that adds interest to the viewing.
Yes, that tiny bit of shadow detail is lovely. I could see a tad more detail in the shadows (maybe it was the conversion to jpg that darkened it even more?). Nice framing/composing of the trees - just lovely.
Wow! Great image here Matt. I love how the backlit trees are surrounded by a dark vignette. Was that how it naturally presented itself? Or did you use some post processing to enhance the effect?
Missed this one - it’s superb, and the way the tree tops seem to be frosted over really creates a fairy-tale effect. A perfect example of how processing to B and W can raise a shot to a higher level. And thank you for showing the original to illustrate this. Love this image!
This image grab my attention due to the fact that the nature (trees) had been condensed down to an appealing graphic image with its fantastic shapes. I like it a lot! The shadows and highlights give these shapes that draw the immediate attention, but there is also details in the dark areas that you then could go on to explore. Very delicate post-processing carried out here!
Just a very minor personal thought, there is a small lit-up tree at the bottom just right of the centre: Maybe it could have been accompanied with a tad of visible texture in the area above it?
I think the move to B/W was a good one. Though, if you would have kept the blue tone of the RAW image, it would have had a nice winter feel to it. (But maybe too obvious.) A few people talked about the little tree in the lower center. At first I agreed about taking it out, but then there is a a big black area that’s not well balanced. I actually think it helps the flow of the eye around one set of trees to the the other as it moves in a nice circle. I started to like how isolated it was, and even tried a vertical crop with it and the trees above it. But it was just too vertical and too much empty space. So, back to, yes, you pulled the right crop from the original frame. Nicely seen and captured.
