Hi everyone. I’d love some feedback on this image please.
Shot in the English Lake District, this image was taken overlooking a prominent mountain called Fleetwith Pike.
The conditions were pretty good. Showers and sunshine for a good few hours with lots of dark and moody atmosphere. The vantage point I had to see the dappled light painting the mountain and valley ahead was amazing. I have aimed to capture this feel in post.
Composition wise, the waterfall acts as a nice leading line down to the lake which was catching some light reflections when the water was calm. this then leads on to the dappled light on Fleetwith. Looking at it now I guess this composition follows the spiral compositional rule which wasn’t necessarily intentional at the time.
Any help and feedback on composition and processing would be greatly appreciated.
Chris, this is a great image. I love the composition and the moody light. I have two small nits: the bright patches of sky, especially the larger one on the left, are distracting and draw the eye away from the rest of the scene. I would darken them. Second, and a smaller nit, is that maybe the dark hillside on which the water is running down could be lightened ever so lightly. Fabulous photo, well done!
The dappled light is just perfect and is really what makes this scene special. The composition works well with the leading line drawing attention to the dappled light which is the star of the show. I agree that the bright clouds are taking attention away from everything else and I would either try to pull those highlights back or take some creative liberty and remove them all together. The biggest thing that is bothering me is I feel the scene is too warm and it’s making everything a bit muddy. Below is a little color balance adjustment I made which I feel really transformed it. I also dodged the waterfall just slightly
Boy, there’s a lot to like here. Echoing some of the above, I agree almost too much and the elements start to compete. I also agree that the dappling is special, and agree with your decision to keep the waterfall from being too bright. I agree about the clouds; nice, but not as strong as the other elements and it’s better if they don’t compete.
Excellent picture Chris I like the slightly cooler rendition of David’s follow up though I must admit I tend to draw the line at cloning or healing out naturally occurring patches of light preferring instead to diminish their impact by subduing it a little. It sort of helps tell the story of where those patches of light came from as well. Everything else though is superb.
Chris, what a stunning image, I love the light and composition that you have here, the combination makes for a very dramatic scene. The warm light hitting the background is just magnificent. I do like what @David_Kingham did with his rework, the overall cooling of the image really accentuates the warm light streaks hitting the mountain. It’s amazing, but what David did with the sky doesn’t even look like it is from the same image, but you know it has to be. I think this discussion is a great illustration of how much latitude we have with the appearance our images via post-processing.
