Grave yard statue/building

mitsugirly · Feb 13, 2009

My sons best friend passed away several years ago when they were only 17 and I went to visit the grave site. There were a lot of really neat statues/buildings in there. It's a fairly old graveyard and most of the stones are HUGE!

Something about this church like statue caught my eye.

I know the picture seems a little too dark and needs to be lightened...is that everyone else's opinion too? Any other suggestions?

stsinner · Feb 13, 2009

I love going to cemeteries.. The only sad part is it really separates the haves from the have nots... Your photo is great! It's a little dark, but I think it's good for the mood of being there. That is one very interesting and expensive monument.

mitsugirly · Feb 13, 2009

Yea, there were a lot of expensive monuments in there. It was pretty amazing. I so wanted to get out and go wandering around taking pictures but I'd probably get lost. It's a huge place! I'll return again some day.

Mgw189 · Feb 13, 2009

You have some dust or something on your sensor/mirror or lens on the upper left of the image.

manaheim · Feb 13, 2009

Kinda overly centered. Framed a bit more with the "thingy" low and to the right with more of whatever on the left would be very cool. Good eye, though. Definitely a neat... whatever that is.

manaheim · Feb 13, 2009

Did you dork around with the sky or something? There's a rather distinct halo of some kind around the thing and the trees.

TheSon · Feb 14, 2009

manaheim said:
Did you dork around with the sky or something? There's a rather distinct halo of some kind around the thing and the trees.

I was wondering that also. Looks almost like an HDR light distortion.

mitsugirly · Feb 14, 2009

manaheim said:
Kinda overly centered. Framed a bit more with the "thingy" low and to the right with more of whatever on the left would be very cool. Good eye, though. Definitely a neat... whatever that is.

I've always shot with whatever the subject is as center focus (I've always had a point and shoot and this is my first slr and I have no idea what I'm doing). I didn't know until joining this forum that you are suppose to shoot with it off to the side???

manaheim said:
Did you dork around with the sky or something? There's a rather distinct halo of some kind around the thing and the trees.

I just downloaded the dynamic phot HDR program last week or so and have no idea what you are suppose to do or how the settings work. So I may have did something I shouldn't have??

TheSon said:
I was wondering that also. Looks almost like an HDR light distortion.

I know theres a dramatic light strength and a dramatic light radius...no clue what they do other than move the light around and lighten it?

Samanax · Feb 14, 2009

Mgw189 said:
You have some dust or something on your sensor/mirror or lens on the upper left of the image.

That's the first thing I noticed too.

mitsugirly · Feb 14, 2009

Samanax said:
That's the first thing I noticed too.

It must have blown on there while I took the picture b/c it's not on any of the others that I see and I took over 200 that day.

Kinda weird that's the "first thing" you noticed in a picture. :lol:

I just find that strange.

Samanax · Feb 14, 2009

mitsugirly said:
It must have blown on there while I took the picture b/c it's not on any of the others that I see and I took over 200 that day.

Dust on the lens generally doesn't show up in your pictures. Dust on the sensor will but not if the aperture is wide open...it's when the aperture is smaller and you're getting a deep DOF that you'll see the dust start to show up in your pictures.

mitsugirly said:
Kinda weird that's the "first thing" you noticed in a picture. I just find that strange.

It's probably because I spent so much time learning how to clean my sensor when I first noticed dust in my pictures...I literally spent a month reading about all the different sensor cleaning products and methods before I settled on the Copper Hill Method. Then it took some time to learn how to actually clean the sensor correctly using just the right angles and pressures.

Now I clean my sensor regularly (at least monthly) because I don't want to see spots in my pictures. I live in Hawaii where the humidity is high and there is a lot of dust in the air...the humidity makes the dust particles damp and sticky and the automatic dust shaker feature of my XTi really doesn't get the dust off the sensor...I have to go in there to clean the sensor manually.

chrisburke · Feb 14, 2009

the dust was actually the first thing i saw too...

puyjapin · Feb 14, 2009

I think i may have tried to move to the right so that th conifer tree was not in the shot, looks a bit like its growing out of the main subject. In terms of the sky you may have been able to make it more blue if you had used a CP filter. imho

mitsugirly · Feb 14, 2009

Yea, I don't know. Like I said I took over 200 pictures that day and there was nothing else on any of them (I just looked). I'll have to check it out and see if I see anything on it still.

As for moving more to the right so the tree doesn't look like it's coming out of it...I wanted to make sure that I got the side with the opening to it. So, if I did that then you would have been looking at only 1 side of the monument. I plan on going back and trying it again if it gets sunny out. I was actually driving by when I stop and took this picture from my car and had people behind me so it was only for a second. Next time I'll stop and get different angles. Thanks for the idea.

I just bought the camera, know nothing about photography and I'm just learning the settings, so I don't have any filters or even know what they are called or what they do. Can anyone point me in a direction to read up on the filters? Do we have one of those here on the forum? The only filter I have right now is a UV-HAZE filter that came with my lens I bought and I have no idea what it does. Explain to me what a CP filter is please.

puyjapin · Feb 14, 2009

The UV filter is a good way to protect the lens. The Circular polorising filter is adjustable and it is very good for cutting out glare and refletion shooting cars and water. If you adjust it to maximum it also deepens the colours of skies and greenery. I normally remove the UV when i use the CP , i just swap them over. Im not sure stacking them is wise.
As far as that spot is concerened if it is a spec on the sensor it will be more noticable on smaller apertures. What aperture did u use on this shot, do you remember?