4 Pics from my trip to Europe C&C

[wlPhotography]

I took all 4 of these from my trip to Europe last summer and have yet to hear what people think about them and what I can do to improve them next time around.

Seine River, Paris France:

Notre Dame, Paris France:

Oxford Courtyard during a short break from the rain:

Oxford Garden:

 

[Sbuxo]

#s 1 & 2 seem flat to me, nothing pops. #2 especially!
#3: not crazy about the storm clouds, they don't fit..and it's a bit too contrasty for the image, almost looks HDRed, did you??
#4: favorite of the set, but again the clouds..clone them out maybe..make them brighter?? It's like..blue sky + rain clouds..I would probably have liked it better if the sky was gloomy too but it isn't. The clouds just take away from the images imo.
In general, I like the composition of all the pictures, but I would clone out that red/black&white striped thing in the lower right hand corner of the last one.

 

[wlPhotography]

You know I was thinking the same thing about the third red and black thing. Ive never noticed it this whole time since Ive taken the photo untill this post. haha and the 3rd photo is a 2 image HDR so I could get better detail on the shadowed area of the building, but I did nothing with the reds, the building is actually a redish tan. The 4th has always been my favorite of these as well.

Thank you for the help!
What do you think I could do to fix the "flatness" of the first 2 next time around?

 

[Sbuxo]

well you could easily fix it on photoshop or just adjusting levels of brightness. Just try exposing correctly, but editing is important too

 

[syphlix]

i'm not sure why but #3 just looks so unnatural to me...

btw isn't it "Seine" river?

 

[TiCoyote]

I actually like #1 the best. I like the contrasting textures between the water, the sky, and the concrete. The blues and greens give it a cool feel (temperature, not awesomeness). #3 and #4 look a bit too saturated. They look overly processed.

 

[wlPhotography]

btw isn't it "Seine" river?

Yes it is the Seine River Sorry for the Typo haha and I agree the more I look at it, it does look over saturated, Ill try to post an edit of it in a bit.

I actually like #1 the best. I like the contrasting textures between the water, the sky, and the concrete. The blues and greens give it a cool feel (temperature, not awesomeness). #3 and #4 look a bit too saturated. They look overly processed.

Im trying to figure out what exactly you meant by the (temperature, not awesomeness) part; Do you mean that you don't like the cool feel of the photo or just that temperature in the photo is not good? The first and 4th are my 2 favorite. Ill try to post another of the 4th image as well with a little less saturation.

 

[Michiyo-Fir]

The 4th one is my favorite. I like the color contrast. I agree perhaps get rid of the heavy dark clouds.

 

[Jeremy Z]

I like the Notre Dame one. The horizon is a bit crooked though; that could stand a bit of tweaking.

Actually, they're all nice.

 

[wlPhotography]

Ok here is an Update on 2 of my previous 4 photo's. I lightened the clouds which though sounded easy took a lot of tweaking because I had a hard time finding a way to brighten just them and nothing else but at the same time trying not to lose the contrast. I also changed up one of the clouds a bit since it started to bug me the more I looked at the photo.

I like the Notre Dame one. The horizon is a bit crooked though; that could stand a bit of tweaking.

Thank you Jeremy for noticing this I straightened it up a bit and I feel it looks much better.

#1 Before:

#1 After:

#2 Before:

#2 After:

 

[sfzoo]

I really like the touch ups.

The horizon fix on #2 looks tricky due to the bend of the canal

nice job

 

[GalvinBrown]

Cool Photos.I love Europe,and really like this awesome pics Europe.Those are simply awesome.Would you please share more pics of Europe skyscraper.

 

[rogerrayenz]

Europe is always the best place for photographers as it has very rich architecture and very royal atmosphere which makes the best condition to explore a photographer's talent.So it same happens to you and it results in such a great photos.Really all the photographs are very VERY beautiful.And 1st and 4th one are best of in my memories.

 

[lvcrtrs]

I thought 3 and 4 had great lighting. Subject in 4 has lots of interesting content to keep the viewer looking to see everything. Your eyes walk through the property. Mine go right to the large building in the left rear then back down to the stone wall, up through the flowers to the small building on the left center and over to the right builidng. I always think it's interesting when a photo does that. It's very quick but you feel eyes doing it and your brain acknowledges each element they go to. Try it. No 3, my eyes go to building, clouds. With 1 and 2 they are dark and my eyes don't really do it.

 

[PJL]

The edit of Notre Dame still looks crooked, but clockwise this time. Use that bridge off in the distance to find level. I know the spire is vertical, but since the canal is taking up the most space and is the center of your shot, it's very distracting that it's twisted.

With Oxford Garden picture, I think it would've been more interesting to see more garden rather than having the building in the middle of the picture.

The one of the Oxford courtyard from that set is my favorite.