A fresh coating of powder on a trail makes for such great showshoeing. I had to stop to photograph a lot of it, especially the bendy parts. I was drawn to the strong lines of the trees and the shadows here as well as the curve of the path itself. By moving slightly left to right I was able to isolate things fairly well and luckily there wasn’t a lot of smaller branches or sticks lying around. This is one of the secret joys of winter for me. The way light and contour come to life in the forest.
Type of Critique Requested
Aesthetic: Feedback on the overall visual appeal of the image, including its color, lighting, cropping, and composition.
Technical: Feedback on the technical aspects of the image, such as exposure, color, focus and reproduction of colors and details, post-processing, and print quality.
Specific Feedback and Self-Critique
This started out a much wider view, but as I worked it I realized this is truly the best part of it. Unfortunately the LRC was basically blank, but since the opposite side holds the most interesting part of the shadows, there’s no way to crop it effectively. So I brought up as much detail in the snow there without, I hope, going too far or making it too crunchy. Good? Weird?
Lr for editing - wb adjustment and a lot to tame highlights. Some texture & clarity. A little sharpening and this crop which is basically the bottom center of the scene.
Hi Kris,
Another great result of your snowshoe adventures. I can’t get enough of it. We haven’t had snow in our area for a while.
This scene is beautiful. I like how the trees are separated in the picture.
I wonder how the image would look if it would show a little bit more of the trees at the top. But I assume you cropped it that way for a reason.
If you hadn’t mentioned it, I certainly wouldn’t have noticed that you worked on the details in the foreground. When I look at it more closely, the LRC looks a little cooler than the rest of the image. But it’s really not very noticeable.
And if I’m going to nitpick, I might lighten up the little details in the shadows here:
Oh boy, thanks for picking up on that @Jens_Ober - it was a glaring goof once you pointed it out to me. I’ve reposted the original crop and a couple more for comparison. I kept it tight, but loosened it slightly for the second one, right to where one tree was intersecting behind another. And then the full scene so you can see what I was dealing with to cut this down to just this area. The second crop needed a little magic eraser so that wasn’t too bad, but the wide scene is just not simplified enough for what I wanted to do.
Kris, the repost is fantastic. Those shadows just make the scene. Reminds me of some shots I took in Yellowstone a few winters ago. I really like the repeating shadows. Awesome.
Thanks @David_Bostock, @Gill_Vanderlip & @Diane_Miller - glad the simplicity works and the cropping isn’t too awkward. It’s hard sometimes to know where to cut things off, but this one sort of just fell into place for me once I could see the trees for the forest.
Another winner. I like the big scene as well, except for the tree leaning out of the frame. I remember being enthralled by these shadows as well when we lived in New Hampshire.
Thanks @Igor_Doncov - ah, New Hampshire, my old stomping grounds. Still miss it in some ways. The license plate motto especially.
Yeah, the leaning trees and the abundance of undergrowth made me reject the wider view in favor of this more concentrated distillation. I have some wide trail shots that I will share as well, but this one seemed like a logical next step.
It’s funny, I went on this outing to test some camera features I never use and shot this in Program shift meaning that if I shifted a setting like aperture or ISO, the program would adjust to that. I’d never used it before and I quite liked it with my shift engaged.
Wonderful winter and shadow image. The path of course is central to the comp and can see why you were attracted to the scene. The shadows to me steal the show though.
My preference is the "slightly wider view " - not a big change, but I like it.
I thought I would play with this and made an attempt to isolate the shadows and make them a little darker, more contrast. I also dodged the LRC and burned down two small areas including the URC. Not a biggie, just tweaking.
Not sure why, maybe I have a classic shadow scene like this in b&w - which I’m surprised hasn’t been suggested. So I shifted gears and went full b&w. I think the shadow lines, shapes and path show well, but not sure it makes the original scene better. But thought I would put this out there.
ps. - no you didn’t go too far on the “crunchy”, not at all; the details in the snow are great and actually make a big difference in the overall presentation.
Hey @Lon_Overacker thanks for taking it out for a spin. These kinds of scenes are open to so many interpretations and I like the slightly darker shadows you pulled out here. Glad it didn’t slip into Captain Crunch territory. I’ve been trying to let images sit for a while before I delcare them “done” and so sometimes things jump out at me, but you all are here to catch the things that don’t.
It’s funny, I don’t go to B&W automatically with winter scenes. Mainly it’s because of the colors in the snow that I quite like although they are subtle and sometimes I think only I can see them (like the voices only I can hear) (kidding!). I also like the quietude the browns and tans in tree bark brings to a scene that I think B&W removes. True, those browns and tans are basically monochromatic to begin with, but there’s something warm and secure about them. Ok. Clearly rambling and should just concentrate on coffee.
WOW – @Lon_Overacker’s B/W works so well here! But just as an alternative – not better or worse, just a different take. The simplicity of the design jumps out at me more in the B/W, although I’m not sure why. I do like the more prominent shadows Lon brought out. I wonder about lightening the trunks a little, to pull out more detail in them.
Thanks @Diane_Miller - Lon’s interpretation is a good one for sure. When I was on this outing I used the Monochrome Preview option in camera which I didn’t really need since it’s so monochromatic anyway. I think I’m good with leaving this in color, but I have some different trail sections in B&W as well. They’re wider views and a bit different, but I’ll post one so you can see.
