Hello, this is my first post in the critique section. I am really hoping to learn a lot so I intend to post a handful of images over the next little bit! I am looking for tips on anything and everything from processing to composition…you name it, fire away. My goal is to eventually make images I would be happy to make the effort to print and hang on my wall!
Any! The exposure was a bit tough here due to the extreme highlights up at the top of the frame, I’ve thought about cropping those out and bringing up the entire exposure for the image.
What artistic feedback would you like if any?
I’m open to any feedback! I’m worried the foreground might be too empty, I liked the green reflection but I’m not sure it’s enough to hold attention.
Pertinent technical details or techniques:
(If this is a composite, etc. please be honest with your techniques to help others learn)
Single exposure with my ISO way too high…before I really know much!
If you would like your image to be eligible for a feature on the NPN Instagram (@NaturePhotoNet), add the tag ‘ig’ and leave your Instagram username below.
Overall I really love this image. I was just in eastern Kentucky and south-eastern Ohio and got to see some similar landscapes and can appreciate the challenges shooting in some of these places. Only suggestion would be to burn down the top right corner to even the exposure some with the foliage to its left some, and clean up a few little leaves or other distractions in the water. There’s a lot you ‘could’ do to it in terms of dodge/burn work to accentuate certain areas you want to hold attention vs others, but I think the visual flow isn’t bad as-is now.
This is a nice one. I would be inclined to crop a tish off the top, and maybe burn the highlights in the reflection just a tish. For the crop, I would go just below the horizontal branch.
Lovely image David, and welcome to NPN! I think the foreground works fairly well with the curve leading you into the scene, I would try to emphasize this a bit more by cropping in on the left a bit to move the curve closer to the lower left corner. I’ve attached some options I was playing with, in one I kept the aspect ratio, in the other I went with 3:4 as I personally don’t like how tall 2:3 images are in portrait, plus it gets rid of the hot spot on the top. Some other small things I would get rid of are the two leaves in the water, if there were more I would leave them, but two just seem distracting to me. I would also get rid of the lit horizontal branch that is directly above the waterfall between the two trees, it doesn’t flow well and the eye is really drawn to it. There’s also the little spot of light on the trunk on the upper right, it’s lovely light but it’s such a small spot that it may come across as out of place and distracting, but I can’t quite decide. This will be a wall hanger for sure despite the high iso, well done!
Hey Jon,
Thanks for the feedback. Scenes up here here can be so chaotic, I have found they really need something to hold the viewer otherwise there are too many distractions. I’m going to go back and take a look at this one again soon, the idea of either darkening down that corner or just cropping it out all together are going to need to happen.
Hey David, thanks for checking this out and I appreciate the feedback! I always tried to crop as little as possible but reading what you said about 2:3 for vertical images makes a lot of sense, it is a long way for the eye to travel. I guess I could see if there were a dramatic sky or something like that to keep you interested but this image doesn’t have that. The leaves need to go, I agree. For some reason I didn’t do that before but you are right, they serve no purpose in the image. I had never noticed the spot on the trunk. I am already seeing why posting here will be helpful!
Thank you for your insight!
Hi Dave, welcome to the community!
A very nice image to start with, I like scenes that are a bit chaotic although they are challenging to deal with.
I understand why you like the reflection, but contrary to the opinion of the other members that reacted to your post I would be tempted to crop most of the water away, to emphasize the small waterfall. I added the cropped image to show the idea.
What a great scene and really well done first post. I too am learning so much from this site. It can be a bit intimidating to critique another’s work when I feel less qualified than other more seasoned artists here, but, it helps me get better so I do. I agreed with the top right being too bright and distracting and David cropping it and showing his version was great! Thank you all and keep posting & critiques civil and productive!
Hello @Han_Schutten this is great feedback, I love seeing how different people have gone in different directions with this. While I believe there are not really “right” or “wrong” choices when editing, I do believe there are a few directions that lead to an overall better image. I haven’t been here long but I am loving the discussion and ideas being shared! I can see I will be learning a lot!
@KenHebert Thank you for the welcome! I was thinking of this earlier today actually. I wasn’t sure how much I should put in right now because I am SO new to this. My plan is probably to lay low for a bit, read the feedback of others to see how it meshes with my thinking before jumping in too strong.
@Igor_Doncov and @Han_Schutten I only have up to 70mm covered with my lenses but when I first got to this scene my thought was that it would be awesome to shoot it from further down the creek with a really long lens…but sadly that still isn’t in the cards. So I can see where both of you are coming from!
So I took another crack at it with some of the suggestions in the comments…I actually went all the way back to the raw file and started again from the beginning.
@David_Wallace As you wrote, there are no “right” or “wrong” edits, the result is a matter of taste and intention. Nothing prevents you from making (and keeping) various images from a raw file. Viewing them once more after a while can lead to a confirmation of your first choice, sometimes the opinion changes. The discussions her reflect the different roads you can take.
David, my reason for the crop was a bit different than Han’s. I felt that the water didn’t integrate with the upper part of the image well because of the solid demarcation of the two. I felt that there was too much visual separation between the upper and the lower part. These separations are more noticeable in vertically oriented images.
This makes a lot of sense and got me really thinking about the differences between vertical vs landscape images. What I’m thinking right now is that the bottom of a vertical image feels like it has more weight than a landscape image. Even though they are the same number of pixels they feel different. I’m not sure if that is because of how our eyes move through the image or what. In this image I see your point, the water is smooth, flat, and not super interesting, then it abruptly jumps to the rock and the small space carved by the water.
I need to ponder this a bit more. Thinking and typing isn’t always the best. I appreciate your feedback, this is the exact reason I signed up, to think about and improve my work!
Welcome to NPN David. This is a great first post, and it has sparked some very interesting discussion about what makes image have more impact. I agree with many of the comments made here, it has been an interesting discussion of creative possibilities.
My thought on this is that your comment on verticals is very dependent on the critical elements that are in a given image. In the case of this shot, I would agree with you, but that will not always be the case, it is image dependent. To me the choice of vertical vs. horizontal mainly depends on whether the image has stronger vertical or horizontal lines/ compositional elements. To me the most interesting elements in this image are the rock cliffs and the way the right side rock frames the background waterfall. To me the reflection is secondary, and not as interesting. Thus i like the rework done by @Han_Schutten. This image has both strong horizontal elements (the rock cliffs), and it has some interesting vertical elements (the trees). This is a case where Han’s squarish crop works well because it emphasizes both vertical and horizontal. In many images the main subject is clearly vertical or horizontal, and you should use the importance of the subject to dictate vertical vs. horizontal.
For example see this recent post by @Jimmy_Arcade, these trees are perfect for a vertical.
In it you see how the river is integrated with its surroundings. In the upper areas the river slowly emerges from the forest. In the lower section the forest is still along the banks and the rocks continue from the upper half deep into the lower half. This composition integrates both sections to form a strong unit. I feel that this is what’s missing in your comp and it’s something I would pay attention to in the future.
That makes perfect sense, I see exactly what you are saying. I appreciate all of your help on this one! I have another image from the same location that is landscape orientation, I’m going to go back and take a look at it to see if I can get a slight crop that removes some of the distracting elements at the top and limits the amount of the bottom pool in the image!
