Last one from the recent Death Valley trip. This one has a very subtle play of light and I am wondering if it has enough impact for people. I experimented with cropping off the right area with the dark sky but like it better uncropped. Same with cropping down. Also, do the salt lines along the valley floor bother you? They don’t me, but that is me. Feel free to share any thoughts on comp, image or processing.
D810, 70-200mm
This one really speaks of the expansiveness of the Valley, Harley. The atmosphere is very intriguing but I’m finding the bright clouds in the upper left distracting. I think I would prefer this cropped into a pano below the bright section. Also, since there is little color going on I would think this would work well in B&W. I’m assuming you must have tried and preferred color?
Harley, the light rays here are very nice, and are what I find most appealing about this scene. I am not bothered by the salt lines, they are not large enough to distract me. I agree with you about not cropping away the right, because the dark area helps to balance the light area on the left. I tried cropping this down to a pano of the bottom half to emphasize the light rays, but felt that didn’t work either. I think @Dave_Dillemuth could be right, a B&W conversion might help this image, because in B&W you could push the contrast in the sky much further than you can in color, and added contrast in the sky might make it more interesting.
Harley,
Love the stormy conditions and the light rays streaking through the squall. I’m curious as well and thought for sure you would have gone b&w here. I agree with Ed that I think the range of possibilities in tone/contrast would be greater in b&w. But then, you may have a good reason why not.
The salt lines at the bottom don’t bother me per se, but is one of those times, where I either want more, or none at all. I think simply because they’re so close to the edge of the frame. But not really an eye magnet.
As presented, this works wonderfully and I have no nits or suggestions (other than b&w.)
Lon
I’ll just copy what they said; I think it looks great but would love to see a black and white to compare.
When were you and Dave there?
