A Couple Long Exposures of Pittsburgh

Hof8231

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C&C always encouraged and appreciated! All pictures taken that night were in RAW with my Canon 5D Mark III, Aperture Priority mode using f/8 or f/10 for 20-30 seconds, and either my Tamron 24-70 2.8 or Canon 70-200 2.8 IS. Thanks for looking!

1.
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2.
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3.
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I know the saturation is a bit high in them, but I liked how the lights/bridges looked when I upped the saturation. Any comments on that (or anything else at all) welcome!
 
I like the overall composition but yes, the saturation is way too much. I wish there were a gentler way to say this, but I quite hate it. The last picture is much better, but those first two are...well, garish. I lived in Pittsburgh for 4 years and know that view from Mt.Washington quite well. Those bridges are already yellow and beautiful without artificial saturation. It's just too much.
 
I like the overall composition but yes, the saturation is way too much. I wish there were a gentler way to say this, but I quite hate it. The last picture is much better, but those first two are...well, garish. I lived in Pittsburgh for 4 years and know that view from Mt.Washington quite well. Those bridges are already yellow and beautiful without artificial saturation. It's just too much.

I appreciate the input very much. I'm now seeing what you mean about the saturation. It is really overwhelming. Meh, not my best effort. I find myself trying to do too much in post processing very often. I need to work on that.
#3 is gorgeous.

Thanks!
 
Toned down the saturation on the first two.

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I could see wanting to bump the colors a bit - the color of those rivers can be a bit dull at times amd you'd want that yellow to pop a bit more - but there are ways to do it in which you select only some colors to highlight, but within more 'normal' ranges so it looks vibrant but not oversaturated. I don't know what PP software you're using, but I'm sure there is a channel mixer or a red/green/blue setting adjustment. Try playing with those instead of just saturating the entire picture.

But as you said, you probably just went to far. I do like the composition and it looks like you pulled off the long exposure quite well. Just dial back on the PP a bit.

And yes, the third one is much much better. That's the Pittsburgh I know and love :) Still a tad bit too far for my taste, but that's just a preference, not a criticism.
 
You posted those edits as I was typing that last comment, so I'm referring to the original pictures, not those edits.

The first one (second one in the original post) seems a lot better to me, more like the third.

I think what's getting me about the shot of the Smithfield+three bridges is that I've never seen the water of the Monongahela that color, so it's always going to seem off to me. But it's definitely getting better.
 
I like the overall composition but yes, the saturation is way too much. I wish there were a gentler way to say this, but I quite hate it. The last picture is much better, but those first two are...well, garish. I lived in Pittsburgh for 4 years and know that view from Mt.Washington quite well. Those bridges are already yellow and beautiful without artificial saturation. It's just too much.
IMO saturation is ok here.
 

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