first landscape with EF 17-40L, CC please

Miti · Mar 5, 2012

Big Mike · Mar 5, 2012

Nice scene, well done. The sky looks fairly noisy though, what ISO were you shooting at?

mjhoward · Mar 5, 2012

As requested (keep in mind these are my opinions and are highly subjective):

The bad:
1. The bottom left corner, I would crop out. It just doesn't belong IMO.
2. The photo is quite grainy. Maybe this was purposely done but a landscape such as this should be noise free (again IMO).
3. If you have a polarizer, you might try using it in a scene like this to reduce some of the haziness in the sky. Haziness isn't really bad here, but it is noticeable in the right portion of the photo where the more distant mountains are.

The good:
1. Lighting and dynamic range here is relatively good. Both, your landscape and the sky are properly exposed and you can even still see the details in the sky. You either waited for a great time of day or you worked your magic in PP, either way, well done in that regard.
2. Great location and good composition (with exception of the lower left corner). Some things that really deter a photographer from making a good photograph is the difficulty of the angle or location. I don't know how much effort you had to go through to get to where you were to shoot this, but you're in a great spot!

Miti · Mar 5, 2012

Thanks mjhoward
Here's another one. I have used a good quality B+W 77mm pol filter but I sill have the haze...

Actually I live here in the middle of Sardinia island in Mediterranean see where I handheld shot this pic in RAW at iso 800 because I used a pol filter that would not let me go higher than 1/80 at f/18. Couldn't get rid of noise in PP as I don't know how to do it.

Big Mike · Mar 5, 2012

Actually I live here in the middle of Sardinia island in Mediterranean see where I handheld shot this pic in RAW at iso 800 because I used a pol filter that would not let me go higher than 1/80 at f/18. Couldn't get rid of noise in PP as I don't know how to do it.

You very likely didn't need to shoot that at F18. The closest elements are not that close to you, so you probably could have put everything into focus by using a smaller aperture like F16 or F11. That would have allowed you to use a lower ISO and/or a faster shutter speed.