First Posting for C&C, Thanks!

brfarris1 · Feb 1, 2012

Any thoughts?

CapitolaSunrise by brfarris1, on Flickr

Thanks,
Brian

Joey_Ricard · Feb 1, 2012

Brian, I think----it's a good first post.

I'm assuming that this is not an HDR (HDR or not), so with that considered
I think your processing is heavy on the shore, but honestly (viewing larger on your Flickr), the top half of the image is great.
You loose the darks/shadows (which are needed) towards the shore in the pink area.

Is this a crop of a larger view? I would like to have seen a wider view.

bazooka · Feb 1, 2012

I've been studying this image for about two minutes now and still haven't decided what to say about it. I think it has a solid organization to it... the way the rocky edge of the shore leads into the curve of the water which extends into the cirrocumulus layer of clouds. My eye keeps travelling up and down this 'line'.

I agree with Joey that the shadows could use a little boost (blackpoint is fine though, just need some small curve adjustment). Also, at this size, I'm not liking the green rock, or whatever it is. It might work when printed large, but here it just seems out of place as it doesn't fit the rest of the color palette. I'm wondering if you could have panned the camera to the left placing the upper part of the s-curve in the right corner, cropping out the weaker right 1/10th of the image, and include more of the coastline. I wonder if that would have caused the image to flow better?

Overall, the shot doesn't jump out and grab me unfortunately, although it certainly looks like it was a spectacular scene, the image as it stands is not equally spectacular. I guess that goes to show that photographs are less about the subject and more about.... well, something else. However, strong first post. I look foward to seeing what else you create.

DiskoJoe · Feb 1, 2012

If you are going to use portrait orientation for a landscape photo I would suggest grabbing a few more frames and stitching the photos together. Here we get the grand sky but at the expense of the nice shoreline which is not shown much as much.

brfarris1 · Feb 1, 2012

This was shot with a D90 with 14mm lens, and the image is not cropped. (Hoping to get a camera with an FX sensor soon.) I agree a wider field of view would have helped. I also shot another image in landscape orientation, but because of the field of view, I was forced to choose between the shoreline and the sky. I agree a pano would have been a good option, but I have never tried to do a pano before.

It is HDR, from 3 images at 2-stop intervals, but my intent was not to "overdo" the HDR. I know some people hate HDR, and I wanted to get some comments on whether people liked the image itself.

Thanks for the comments!
Brian

rambler · Feb 1, 2012

I think I understand what is confusing people. You have a beautiful scene. I see why you took the photo, but... You need to make a choice. What is most important here, the sky, the rocks, or the ocean? The nearby rocks helps with giving depth, but the light green patch draws our eyes there. The ocean has some reflection of light and a few waves hit the shore, but again they are "negative space" helping us again with depth. Then we have a darkened shore line and an expanse of colored sky. Notice what the far shore line is doing. That is your horizon line and it divides the image in half. Unfortunately it does divide the image almost 50/50. So our eyes spend equal time on both halves, we do not see the image as one unit. My eyes go to the rocks, look up for several seconds at all that water, then drift up to the sky. What do you want us to look at land, sea or sky?
My point is, do not have your horizon in the middle. If you want to show that beautiful sky then get us focused quickly on that sky.

Try right here scrolling down until the middle line of rocks and a bit of the breaking wave is close to the bottom of the frame. Suddenly you have a lot more attention on the sky.

Now try scrolling upwards, you lose the pink clouds, but now more of our attention is on the rocks in front and the shore and the reflecting ocean.

Which of the halves do you want to emphasize the most?

Brfarris1, I just read your comment again. Your wide angle lens was forcing you to do just what I wanted you to do! Choose between sky and shore. Emphasize one or the other instead of trying to include it all in one shot!!!!

Okay, you say, you want it all. Well, what if you had gotten down at a lower angle, right up close and personal to the big rocks in front so that they appear even bigger. Now the space between the rocks and the far shore would also appear closer because there would be a lot less of the ocean. The effect would be to bounce our eyes up much quicker to the sky which is a good thing to look at. Right?

I hope no one notices the influence of the "rule of thirds" in my comments.

brfarris1 · Feb 1, 2012

Thanks for your comments!
Brian

ArtByQJ · Feb 1, 2012

DiskoJoe said:
If you are going to use portrait orientation for a landscape photo I would suggest grabbing a few more frames and stitching the photos together. Here we get the grand sky but at the expense of the nice shoreline which is not shown much as much.

I think the photo is pretty cool... i think the orientation throws it a little off for me ...would have gone landscape...but still makes me want to go to a beach

KmH · Feb 1, 2012

I get the impression of a card that has been opened. The card has a photo of some sky in the top half of the card, and a shot of a shoreline in the bottom half of the card, because the horizon/waterline was placed just about dead center in the frame right about where I would expect to see a crease in the card.