Constructive Criticism please!

[gsgary]

From what i see they arn't getting much better, first you need to go somewhere that is nice with some scenery because none that you have posted so far are very appealing, i don't shoot landscapes because i find it very boring but when i do it is of nice places, this was shot with a cheap point and shoot when on a motorbike tour
http://gsgary.smugmug.com/Competitions/Miscellaneous/DSCF0462p/341433565_Jw6RA-L.jpg

 

[KevinPutman]

If only it were that simple,
there's not many places here that are nice to shoot. Especially landscape.
But thanks!

 

[Ron Evers]

The white balance is way off in them all. Far too blue.

 

[KevinPutman]

The white balance is way off in them all. Far too blue.

I was wondering what that was from!
How to fix it?

 

[gsgary]

If only it were that simple,
there's not many places here that are nice to shoot. Especially landscape.
But thanks!

Don't shoot landscapes then, do some street photography or abstract, here something i was playing with the other night but i will have to get the old 1Dmk1 out for 1/500 flash sinc i'm also going to use some backlighting next time

 

[subscuck]

The white balance is way off in them all. Far too blue.

I was wondering what that was from!
How to fix it?

ACR

 

[KmH]

For me, all your photos are dark (under exposed) and dreary. When you edit you seem to make them even darker.

By centering the horizons they look like 2 photos jammed together. Decide if you want the foreground, or the sky, to be the main subject, and then frame accordingly. As they are now the 2 elements have virtually equal visual weight, and compete for the viewers attention.

I guarantee more people will want to look at your photos if you concentrate on getting the right light and learn more about composition.

 

[manaheim]

If only it were that simple,
there's not many places here that are nice to shoot. Especially landscape.
But thanks!

Don't shoot landscapes then, do some street photography or abstract, here something i was playing with the other night but i will have to get the old 1Dmk1 out for 1/500 flash sinc i'm also going to use some backlighting next time

omfg that's cool.

 

[vtf]

Tripod, 10 second shutter, in focus.
1/10th shutter hand held???? Asking for trouble.

 

[enzodm]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say they all seem oof because of my Fstop being wide open. (Except the moss on the last one, that was simply because I didn't focus right up close. I thought it would be better to have the mid/far range parts of the picture in focus, rather than the upclose/mid range.

All are shot at wide end of zoom (6mm, equivalent to 36mm). #1 is shot at f/5, 1/10s; #2 at f/5.6, 1/4s; #3 is at f/2.7, 1/25s. As already told in another of your threads, with your camera, shallow DoF is not such a problem (if you focus at the wide end to 3m or so, it should be mostly all in focus). The problem is shutter speed: without a tripod, 1/4s will almost always generate soft images. Instead of tripod, also one hour before could do the trick, plus 200ISO (your are trading noise for motion blur -choose what you want, the result is not that good).

Said that, I also suggest again this: 10 Top Photography Composition Rules (e.g., rule of thirds).

By the way, while I'm always tempted by this kind of landscapes, I too often shoot uninteresting pictures - often those places are better than their pictures, at least when taken from traditional points of view and traditional composition, where only technical perfection may save them.

 

[Bitter Jeweler]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say they all seem oof because of my Fstop being wide open. (Except the moss on the last one, that was simply because I didn't focus right up close. I thought it would be better to have the mid/far range parts of the picture in focus, rather than the upclose/mid range.

The underexposure was due to shooting when it was so close to nighttime. (The sun had already set). I had to significantly bump up the brightness in PP.
I refuse to shoot anything over ISO 200 on my Canon, and rarely will go over 100, due to the amount of noise it puts out. And I needed to leave my exposure time shorter, to combat the camera shake.

Which should answer your question, No, I haven't gotten a tripod yet. Bear with me. I'm thinking as of now I'll need a gorilla pod before an actual tripod, because I take most of my shots close to the ground. Although both would be great.
I'm making due without.

As for interest,
how am I supposed to find something interesting in the foreground, midground, and background, when there is nothing interesting to shoot?
The subject of #1 is the log. It's almost to the midground. The rocks provide interest in the foreground. And the background would be the sky. There's not much more "interesting" things to shoot out at a lake in Nebraska. No pretty flowers, no interesting wildlife. I'm making due with what I've got.


But thanks for your feedback guys.

Stop making excuses. You NEED a tripod. If you know your exposure triangle, you KNOW you need longer shutter times. Your image quality will continue to suffer until you do. Why take shots that you already know will fail because of your limitations, and post them for CC? You are not "making do".

If you continue to complain about how boring your area is, stop shooting landscapes! You could run with what you got if you could make your images make a statement about it, but you aren't. Start looking for photographers that successfully do so.

You keep complaining about the lack of subjects in your area...flowers etc...HOGWASH! You just don't know how to SEE. I am sure there is interesting stuff to be found. You need to stop looking for boring landscapes, flowers and wildlife at your doorstep. Stop being so narrow minded. Go to the library and get books of photography of all kinds, other than landscapes. You have said in the past you don't want to be tainted by looking at other peoples work. Look at how stymied you are! Free your mind!

Whine, whine, whine.

You are looking at getting a better camera, which is awesome, and will open some doors to you, but the new camera wont come with a disk of better subjects for you. Open your eyes and your brain!

 

[KmH]

1

I straightened the horizon (9°, that's a lot), cropped away the tilted edges and then cropped so the waterline is on the top ROT horizontal, brought the foregound exposure up, set the white balance.

 

[manaheim]

^^^ still massively tilted.

Water finds its own level, but hills and mountains do not. Level on the WATER... not the horizon.

 

[KmH]

I used the only straight waterline in the photo, there at the upper left edge, but you're right it's still off 0.5°.

If the OP had a tripod with level bubbles on it.....

 

[KevinPutman]

I've always been curious to see how another photog would make out shooting in the same area as me.
In other words, someone come out to the lake across the street from my house, and shoot for a bit, around the same time of the day, then show the results.
I'm just curious as to what they're different POV's, and such would be.

Hmmm


Also
how's this for some extra PP? (Is it just me or does it look even softer now?)