Found this neat fern covered oak while driving through Mayakka state park in Florida. The spotlight on the roots is what caught my .
The scene was extremely green so I tinted the greens a bit to the yellow.
What technical feedback would you like if any?
any is welcome
What artistic feedback would you like if any?
any is welcome
Pertinent technical details or techniques:
(If this is a composite, etc. please be honest with your techniques to help others learn)
gfx 50r with a 24mm tilt shift lens and a couple degrees of tilt. @ f16. Single image.
I put my tripod as high as it would go and was able to stand on a nearby log to make the shot
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I love the tree and its environment, so well presented by the wide angle lens. Lovely light and the inclusion of the water in the BG gives a wonderful sense of depth. On the medium-format sensor I’m guessing it would be about 16mm equivalent on a full-frame? Before I read the description I was struck by an obvious wide-angle that didn’t have keystone distortion. It sounds like you were looking down a bit but you must have been able to aim level since there was no shift. Well done!
Matt, I like to see a story in an image as in this one. This oak hold’s itself firmly on the red colored ground and is warning the others not to come too close to his green arms.
Beautiful scene, with a fine central story, along with great secondary elements - reflections, ferns, small tree textures. For me, the red spotlight is quite demanding of eye attention, and it might be easier to explore the rest of the image if that were a bit less bright.
You have a good eye to spot this wonderful tree with great spotlight on the root. Greens are tricky, but I really like what you have done to keep the pic looking like what your eye caught.
Thanks everyone for the great feedback. My biggest issue was dimming down the sky in a natural way. So I guess I did a good job since no one mentioned that. I will take all the feedback in account. Thank you .
Gorgeous old tree. The detail is very impressive. I do find the wee spot of light at the base of the tree just a touch too bright it perhaps draws the eye too much towards the centre area and dissuades you from following those beautiful fern and moss covered branches off to the corner of the frame an area I find just as enjoyable.
I’m coming in late here but the bright patches of sky at the top were a major distraction to me. The tree itself is marvelous, and I love the composition, I love the radiating lines created by the placement of the tree and it’s roots. And the concept of having the spotlight effect at the base of the tree is brilliant. But the bright sky patches are eye magnets for me, and they detract/distract from the rest of the scene. Sometimes you can use Lights Luminosity masks to tone them down, but that didn’t work well when i played with this. So i think some careful cloning away would help in this case.
Some of the other comments here touch on the spotlight effect being too strong. I agree, but I think the spotlight concept is still a key part of of this image, and that all you need to do is a better job of achieving tonal balance across the scene. I did a rework (with the cloning too) that used TK Luminosity masks to darken the darks at the base of the tree, dodged the lighter tones in the mossy branches in the top third of the image, and slightly burned the highlights in the main spotlit area. I think the net effect of this a better tonal balance in the scene. This is such a powerful image and composition that you should certainly invest the time to tweak it further.
