Non-traditional....opinions.

[wyogirl]

I found this in some older shots. I think I kind of like it. Its not traditional landscape. What do you all think? Be honest.

 

[Derrel]

It might be pretty good printed. It might have a lot of appeal in its "native area". it is a most-unusual type of geography, for sure. I looked at it BIG, and scrolled around...that shows some on-screen noise and granularity which I think a PRINT would hide, and the printed form would make it much,much more an all-at-once viewing experience. On screen it's a bit difficult to get the most out of thins kind of photo. I think if it were printed, and with more clarity and local contrast added in processing and print prep, it might look pretty good if it's seen BIG enough.

Overall, the local contrast seems a bit too low [overcast day?]. There are not a lot of shadows, and the tones are fairly similar: I think some of the high-tech, new-fangled software from Nik could help define the features more, and prepare the file for a good print made on smooth, glossy paper. But a print would need to be a larger-than-normal size to make this visually rewarding. If this had been shot on say, 8x10 transparency film with a killer lens under ideal comditions, it would rock.WHat a shot like this one requires is DETAIL. Lots of resolving power, to visually reward the eye.

A case in point: I LOOKED at this at 3,500x piels and looked at the area to the left of center, 1/4 of the way up from the bottom...those rocks look COOL! Buuuuuut, they're seen pretty small...and they are not defining themselves too much via shadows or size, when seen on-screen. Pictures like this are really difficult to appreciate on the world wide web. The web just crushes and then purees then strains images like this...

 

[wyogirl]

Thanks Derrel. I'm still toying with it. It was overcast, actually I think it was raining. I like the shapes and colors and I am wondering if I blurred it into a more abstract and less of a landscape if it would work better. It is noisy

 

[Derrel]

Printing can sublimate noise. I do not think that going more-abstract and lower-detail is the best way to go on this particular type of landscape image. This kind of terrain is fascinating due to its details, and that odd purple-ish coloring is lovely, but I don't think that lowering the detail will help this shot be better. Looking at say, PixelRabbit's or Mishelle's abstracted, blurry type stuff, there's always at least "some" baseline level; of detail present. I think if this starts being blurred it'll just go to blobs of color, and the lack of "defining features" like say, big trees, or tree lines, or whatnot, will hurt it. But I could be wrong. It might work You could try and see,.

I have to ask--is this Montana or Wyoming? Again...this to me looks like Mars or Jupiter...other-worldly, kind of a WEIRD landscape; perhaps if it is local to that area, it might be appreciated there, in that region, even if or maybe especially **if** it were blurred and made more impressionistic.

 

[wyogirl]

I have to ask--is this Montana or Wyoming? Again...this to me looks like Mars or Jupiter...other-worldly, kind of a WEIRD landscape; perhaps if it is local to that area, it might be appreciated there, in that region, even if or maybe especially **if** it were blurred and made more impressionistic.

LOL-- Its Wyoming. Just East of Farson. I'm still playing with it. Thanks for the input.

 

[WesternGuy]

When I first saw it, it reminded me of some of the landscape scenery that I saw last year when I was in the South Dakota Badlands. The Farson area of Wyoming is not that far away, so maybe the geology is similar - don't know. Regardless, the image itself is very flat, there are no shadows that are usually used to provide depth in images such as this - probably because of the overcast skies you noted. If there was some way to add contrast or tonal texture to the image, then this might help it. Have you tried a black and white conversion? I don't know what software you have available to you, but as Derrel has suggested, some of the Nik software "plugins" might be useful - Color Efex Pro 4 for some of the various filters that are available, or Nik's Silver Efex Pro 2 for the black and white conversions. Nik's Color Efex Pro 4 might help to provide some contrast or more detail in the colours that are present in the image. If these was a way to bring up some of the colours then the contrast might help - don't know, just throwing out ideas as I sit here and type.

When I enlarged the image, it looks very grainy, so maybe processing through some de-noising software might help get rid of some of this granularity. HTH.

WesternGuy