Tips on Pictures

[mitchel5150]

Hello all!
Ive been lurking around on this forum for a while and decided to finally sign up!
I have only been doing this this "seriously" for about 2 months.

Any tips or compliments on my pictures?
You are welcom to edit them to show me ideas. I do not have any photo editing software so what would you guys suggest i dont want to spend that much money much on it?
THANKS!

 

[tirediron]

C&C per req:
For future posts, please number your images and leave a couple of lines of space in between to make it easier to view can critique. Overall the subject matter is very nice. Technically however, the images are in dire need of post (and your camera's sensor desparately needs cleaning!).
1. Very nice, like the colours, however the man-made object (just below the far shoreline, slightly right of middle) is very distracting.

2. This iamge needs to be levelled and reduced in contrast. Compositionally, I think it's a little too centred; ideally I'd like to see the mountain set about 1/3 either side (The 'rule' of thirds).

3. Good macro, but slightly over-exposed, and over-saturated.

4. Extreme highlights and shadow in this one, but well focused.

5. Again excess contrast/saturation, but a well captured image.

You clearly need an application to do post-processing. If cost is an issue, I recommend The GIMP (www.gimp.org). This an outstanding image-editor, with much of the functionality of Adobe Photoshop, and it's FREE!

Just my $00.02 worth - your milage may vary.

~John

 

[mitchel5150]

thank you for the response. its my sensor or if i just had a dirty lense at the moment. The dragon fly picture was my lates picture i have taken. Does it look like i still have a dirty sensor?

 

[tirediron]

I can't see anything in the dragonfly image, but that may be due to the soft focus in the background. If you look in the Mt. Baker image, you can clearly see the spots all over the skyline. These are definitely sensor dust. It's not difficult to clean your sensor, but you do have to be careful. Although expensive, I recommend the Arctic Butterfly (www.visibledust.com) to everyone with a digital SLR that doesn't have a built-in sensor cleaning system.

To check how clean your sensor is, take a photograph of a plain, white with your lens stopped down to a fairly high aperture and then look at the image on your computer. The dust spots will be clearly visible.

 

[mrodgers]

I have been dying to get color in my sunsets like that. Sunsets around where I am are terrible. It is very hilly with a lot of woods and it seems like the sun is gone before any colors come out.

 

[jenn76]

I see why tirediron said your dragonfly pic was a bit oversaturated, but I really like it! I love the colors.

 

[reg]

I see why tirediron said your dragonfly pic was a bit oversaturated, but I really like it! I love the colors.

On my monitor, the colors are garish to the point of hurting my eyes. It's to the point of having a sharp green color cast in some areas and no I don't mean the background, I mean the huge color blowouts you get when you oversaturate.

 

[kundalini]

Hope you don't mind, but I had a go with #2.

Original:

Cropped, tilted, slight luminance changes, cloned out the worst offenders of dust:

An alternative, but not a replacement, to the Artic Butterfly is the Giotto Blower. Remove lens, turn camera facing down and blow. It'll knock a lot of loose stuff off.

 

[manaheim]

The effect on 2 and 4 are very cool. I think the PP work is a bit off, but the end result is still pretty slick. Shows a lot of promise no matter what.

BTW, is that mount hood by any chance? My parents live in Oregon... that's the only mountain out there I "know" and my reaction when I saw it was "Oh! That looks like mount hood!" I'm sure it's not, though.

This is probably akin to "Oh, you live in Washington... do you know Bill Gates??"

 

[Joves]

Another way to check you sensor id point it to blue sky @ f22 or better and, snap a pic. You may need to go to manual focus mode to get it to fire. I do it every once in awhile to double check my sensor.

 

[Tolyk]

Kundalini, I find your edit really noisey.

I love the original sunset image and the dragonfly

 

[danjchau]

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[kundalini]

Kundalini, I find your edit really noisey.

I found the image really noisey when I right-clicked "save picture as".........:er:

 

[brileyphotog]

With the exception of the dog picture, I thought these were fantastic, dust aside. I think a lot of people around here get tired of looking a pet photos