The weather was cold windy and wet. I waited for breaks in the weather and the sun to break clear. I could feel the cold, the sleety rain but I knew there would be a break.
I would firstly like to know about the composition should I crop more of the bottom of the frame and secondly do people feel the cold and winter light after rain
SS 1/250, ISO 160, F7.1 200mm. Minimal processing in LR
Love this type of scene!
I might try a totally dark version that more accentuates the brightness contrasted with the midtones that are exposed properly here. As-is the top right is too bright for me and it’s all I look at.
Second, I think it was probably level, but due to the way the shoreline is oriented, it looks tilted, so you might try to straighten it out based on the shoreline as your guide.
Hi David,
I agree with Matt about the upper right brightness and the level of the shoreline. Because of the tonality in the image, i’m not sure i"m feeling the cold or winter-is feel. It’s a bright somewhat sunny day with some mist/fog.
I think I would ask “what is the story here?” What are you trying to have the viewer feel? From your answers, then crop and adjust to accentuate the feeling you are trying to impart to the viewer. I love the mist and the headlands there so I would crop tighter, darken the cliffs without losing the mist to create more of a stormy/wintery feel. Like all art, it’s a personal choice. 
The featureless sky kind of hurts this image. The color scheme is a bit strange as well.
Thanks for the feedback. I will take it on board and have another go at editing the image. Do really appreciate the critiques.
The image definitely could use a clockwise rotation as that’s actually the first thing I notice about this image, David. Also, if it’s a cold and blustery day you are looking for, I would pull the exposure way down as I feel like it’s too bright for a stormy day. I think there are some clouds lurking in the sky but I can’t see them since they are so bright. I love the coastal cliffs in this image but I’m not a fan of super sharp water so maybe a slower shutter speed to smooth the water out next time. Here is a very fast and crude edit that I took too far just to see if there was something in the sky.
Thanks David. I am heading in that direction.
David,
I certainly like the atmosphere captured here; the ocean “mist” is thick and glowing with highlights from the sun. And for that, I really don’t get the feeling of a clearing storm - or even rain for that matter. It’s simply what the air and atmosphere looks like during much of the year along any ocean coast. Even David’s darker presentation still comes across as a foggy day at the beach.
Of course I wasn’t there, but certainly can relate to the biting wind and fog standing on a bluff and experiencing a scene just like this.
One of the difficulties of coastal landscapes, at least for me, is the receeding shoreline - it’s all about angles, distance, etc. and we know that the shore can’t be “level” simply because the cliffs and shore aren’t all facing perpendicular to us… Anyway, some rotation can reduce the effect, but reality says the shore is receeding and optically won’t appear that way either. The cliffs and striations in the rock tell me the image is level… Tough to compose these, IMHO.
Having said that, yeah, you could crop from the bottom. I would only consider cropping from the top and go for more of a pano approach - if you don’t work on the sky. What I mean is that I wouldn’t crop the top of David’s edit.
I think the sunlight creating a glow inthe fog/rain is what this one is about.
Lon
