I was intrigued by the colors and textures of these rocks at low tide in Acadia, NP Maine. Although many photographers associate Acadia with classic seascape and fall foliage images, I actually love Acadia for it rocks. This was shot on an overcast day, which was perfect for revealing all of the subtle colors in the rocks. The seaside rocks in Downeast Maine just have so much color in them, I’m constantly amazed by what I find.
What artistic feedback would you like if any?
Any comments or critique are welcome
Pertinent technical details or techniques:
Canon 5D MKIV, Canon 70-200mm f4, ISO 100, 1/3 sec at f16
Just gorgeous, Ed ! The hues and textures make the image, but the comp is also very satisfying with the spread of green along the botton offsetting the blues and browns above, with the jutting rock across the frame separating them.
You have found a very interesting subject, Ed. My only nit is that the brightest part of the image is a little too close to the LL corner for my taste. I think it downplays the beautiful textures of the rock on the opposite corner.
I like the idea Ed. But issue is with the color composition where we have all one color in one area and another different color in the rest of the image. I don’t know if others are even bothered by this. If you remove all color as below the composition holds up better.
What a lovely intimate landscape this is. I love the colors and wouldn’t convert to B and W. The left side of the image is most interesting to me, so I might consider a vertical around the middle of the present photo, or just to the right of middle. Very nicely seen. Next time I go to Acadia (I have only been there once), I’ll pay more attention to the rocks!
Love this. Love the richness and diversity of color. I also think the composition is strong with the 3 major blocks or sections of rock all being tied together by the mossy seaweed stuff?..
Not sure I have anything to suggest that would improve upon this.
@Lon_Overacker@Igor_Doncov@Ian_Wolfenden@Kathy_Barnhart@Adhika_Lie thank you all for your comments and input they are appreciated. Adhika, I think you are right, I need to consider some tweaking to luminosity and saturation of the yellow seaweed, and/or also try to do more to tweak and draw attention to the colors in the rocks above.
Igor, I think your comment about all one color in one place, and other colors in another place is perhaps a similar issue to what Adhika mentioned, and I need to think about ways to do somehting about it. I’d like to come up with some tweak in color first before also moving to B&W. I think some local tweaks to WB to get more contrast between cool and warm colors in the rocks would help the help color version. and this type of change would allow for more separation of tones in a B&W version as well. I think the textures and shapes play very well in your B&W rework, but if starting from a different color version I could get more tonal separation in B&W as well.
Ed, I wasn’t suggesting that you should modify it to B&W. I don’t particularly like B&W at all, at least not my version of it. I just used the conversion to show how the color comp issue resolves without color. Another words tonally it’s well composed. Again, this is just my take on it. I’ve seen these types of color comps being chosen for weekly picks (Hirschmann’s birches even made it to yearly picks) so not everyone sees it that way.
I put a white frame around this image today, a wide one, and the comp came together for me more than before. So take my previous critique with a grain of salt. Btw, I have recently discovered that I can see an images problems much more accurately if I print it. I’m not sure why.
This is one of the reasons why I suggested to you that printing is an integral part of my photographic process, which I don’t consider complete until the image is printed. When you see it printed large, and are holding it in your hands, every tiny little processing/composition flaw becomes glaringly apparent. Printing forces you to become much more meticulous about your processing. I don’t print all of my images, but any image that is worthy of being included in my portfolio galleries on my website usually gets printed first, it helps to take my processing up another notch. Having images critiqued here at NPN, and printing the image, are two very rigorous ways to quality control the processing of an image, before sharing with a wider audience.
