C&C please on my mountain pivture

[john sherratt]

Hi so i thought i would post a picture i took today i'm still very new to this and have a lot to learn but i think it looks ok is it a keeper or delete it lol thanks john.

 

[480sparky]

It's a keeper with a few simple edits. Adjust the black & white points, put a slight S in the curve, and bump the saturation up a tad.

With the original full-size image (preferably a raw file) it could be improved even more.

 

[john sherratt]

Awsome thank you here is the orignal sorry it is not in raw i do not own any photo editing software apart from what i got with my D7000 veiw NX2 i cropped out the town for the moutain veiw was that a good idea? Also i had the cloud shaddow on the bottom right i tryed to crop out as much as i could thank you john.

 

[480sparky]

View NX can display and edit Nikons NEF files.

 

[Big Mike]

Looks like you were up on Sulphur Mountain.

The main issue is a lack of contrast. This can often be helped, as Sparky did, by using a 'levels' adjustment and moving the black point & the white point. A curves adjustment helps the mid-tones. The boost to saturation was needed as well. Some software (Lightroom for example) has a clarity adjustment, which would help as well.

If you were shooting this again, I'd suggest lowering your exposure a little bit. The shadows would probably turn black, but that's not a big deal if the rest of the shot turns out better.
Also, a polarizing filter would have been great in this situation. It can darken blue skies, making the clouds pop out more...and probably a few other enhancements as well.

But we also need to consider the time of year, time of day and weather etc....and how those affect air quality. Late summer is typically a terrible time for air quality...especially on a hot day...especially if it hasn't rained. That's likely why there is so much haze in the image...there is just so many particles in the air that when you shoot though so much air, the photos will be hazy.

 

[john sherratt]

Looks like you were up on Sulphur Mountain.

The main issue is a lack of contrast. This can often be helped, as Sparky did, by using a 'levels' adjustment and moving the black point & the white point. A curves adjustment helps the mid-tones. The boost to saturation was needed as well. Some software (Lightroom for example) has a clarity adjustment, which would help as well.

If you were shooting this again, I'd suggest lowering your exposure a little bit. The shadows would probably turn black, but that's not a big deal if the rest of the shot turns out better.
Also, a polarizing filter would have been great in this situation. It can darken blue skies, making the clouds pop out more...and probably a few other enhancements as well.

But we also need to consider the time of year, time of day and weather etc....and how those affect air quality. Late summer is typically a terrible time for air quality...especially on a hot day...especially if it hasn't rained. That's likely why there is so much haze in the image...there is just so many particles in the air that when you shoot though so much air, the photos will be hazy.

Thank you for your relply yes it was Sulphur Mountain i have a B&W polarizing filter which i did not use. Becaause i'm not sure if i should use it with the Tokina 11-16 ive read lots of things and some say yes on a UWA and some say no so i'm still not sure if i should or not.

 

[Big Mike]

Thank you for your relply yes it was Sulphur Mountain i have a B&W polarizing filter which i did not use. Becaause i'm not sure if i should use it with the Tokina 11-16 ive read lots of things and some say yes on a UWA and some say no so i'm still not sure if i should or not.

Don't put so much stock into what other people say (including me, )
The reason that people will say not to use a CirPol on a wide lens, is that the effect will not be even across the sky. A polarizer it at it's strongest when pointed at 90 degrees to the sun's rays. The more parallel your point of view is to the sun's rays, the less effect it has. So if you have an ultra wide angle lens that can see a whole lot of sky, the darkening effect will fade in and out across the image.

Some people think that is a deal breaker, but I usually don't mind. Sometimes it's very pronounced, sometimes is subtle...it's up to you to test it out and see what you get.