This was a calm late summer morning in the Canadian Rockies lovely light and calm waters inspired me to take an image.
Please shred this apart if you have to… I am here to learn and improve
What technical feedback would you like if any?
Any tips and feedback is welcome.
Would you have composed it differently? why and how?
What artistic feedback would you like if any?
Any tips and feedback is welcome.
Would you have processed it differently? why and how?
Pertinent technical details or techniques:
(If this is a composite, etc. please be honest with your techniques to help others learn)
Focus Stack
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Aref - This is a beautiful sunrise photo. I would suggest cropping off some of the rock (not all ) on the bottom. The amount of rock you have makes them too prominent in the photo and I think the real beauty is in the mountains, sky colors and reflections. It’s worth a try anyways to see if you like it.
A beautiful and peaceful early morning. Most serene. I like @Carol_Nichols ’ crop idea. The rocks look good in the small version, but overwhelm a bit for me in the large.
Gorgeous light on a beautiful scene. The rocks are somewhat visually heavy but I like the feeling in the original that their bases are almost visible – I’d be interested to see even a bit more of them at the bottom if you have it. They might be made a bit less prominent if their contrast was reduced a bit. The reflection and mountains, and the beautiful mist, can compete with them.
Is there any more canvas on the left so that small rock isn’t cut at the edge? If not, and you choose to crop from the bottom, I would not leave the tiny bit of water below it.
Small nits for a gorgeous capture!
A strong image such as this can often have more than one successful interpretation.
This is a lovely image, Aref. The crop suggestion is a good call as the FG rocks are a little dominant although I think I would only crop up to just above the rock in the LRC. I like the fact that you kept separation between the rocks and the reflection of the mountain and the morning light is absolutely gorgeous. The thing that catches my eye; and it may be just me because no one else has mentioned it; is the vegetation growing up in the water. I think I would try to clone that out. Just my opinion of course. I can see why you were inspired to trip the shutter.
Let me begin by saying this was already a very good image to start with. Beautiful light, nice mist on the lake, and a good job of processing. I also agree with the various comments you received on composition. Some small tweaks in the composition of this image can elevate this image from very good to great.
For me it’s not that the rocks are too dominant, rather I think there is room for improvement with how the rocks interact with the edges of the frame. Where you cut off these rocks with the frame edge should appear to be a deliberate choice rather than accidental. My areas of concern with the edges in the original post were as follows.
I don’t think a panoramic aspect ratio is the only possible solution. Here is a rework that I did that maintained your original 3:2 ratio. I think this makes some of the edge choices appear more deliberate. When an image is already good to start with, it’s subtle tweaks that can elevate it even further.
Great suggestions above, and as noted on a beauty to start with. My 2-cents to add would be that the reflection is about as bright as the sky, and I would expect it to be less. You could darken the reflection and foreground a bit, and that might help with the rocks too.
@Ed_McGuirk man thanks a lot for taking the time to share these detailed notes.
I love the new crop . I will make sure to keep that in mind next time. To be honest i have not even paid attention to those small details at the edges but they seem to make the difference
Thank you @Ed_Lowe yeah that plant grows of the water i wonder what others thought of it as i actually deliberately left it in there in fact one of my focus stack shots was making sure it is sharp. I found that it broke the symmetry of the reflection which i thought adds to the image!
Unedited it is a wonderful image. Thanks for posting. I agree with most of the suggestions and also think Ed’s redo makes a better photo. My suggestion is to darken the highlights slightly, as so:
