River Flow - Please critique

[bartonkj]

Please critique the following photo. - See my next post below....

55mm
ISO 100
f/38 @ 3.0s
manual focus

 

[Trenton Romulox]

First off, the shot is way too blue. Secondly, although the branches at the top can sometimes be used a framing technique, they are too underexposed, thin, and scraggly to effectively be used as such in this shot. Work on warming up the white balance and composition for a shot like this.

 

[Sideburns]

sorry, I don't see it.

 

[bartonkj]

As far as the blue I posted the wrong photo. Here is the one that should have been posted.

 

[Trenton Romulox]

Well, the WB is definitely better, but the branches at the top and the highlights on the right edge in the water are bugging me too.

 

[bartonkj]

Do you like the composition on this one any better?

 

[Sideburns]

Yes, the second one is WAY better. I like it. Perhaps a bit bright in parts, but that's ok. Maybe a polarizer would help...or an HDR would perhaps really do this photo justice.

 

[gizmo2071]

I prefer the second for composition, but it lacks contrast.
I wouldn't be to afraid to maybe blow the highlights in the water a little more, it will surely bring your attention to it.
I may have gone a little over the top, but it's hard to edit a small resolution.

Process:
Deepened the shadows and slightly bossted midtones and highlights in curves.
Slightly darkened the red channel.
Unsharpen Mask - 100%amount 0.3radius 1 threshold
Burn tool - Midtones - 10% and darkened small areas around the whites in the water to make it pop a little more.
Selected the bank and trees in the left hand side, boosted contrast and brightness.

 

[bartonkj]

Thanks for the suggestions - I will try another edit of the raw photo to try some of your tips when I get home. I will post my results .

 

[bartonkj]

I tried to take some of your suggestions on the editing of the photo but not sure I got it right - here it is anyway. I wasn't able to do everything you did simply because I am not experienced enough in photoshop....

 

[ranmyaku]

I like what gizmo did but i would have desaturated the cyans some. the water has a weird blue tint to me.

 

[bartonkj]

I haven't explored the realm of modifying colors yet - that is a little complicated for me since I am still a newbie in such things as that; and, I have some color vision problems which make that more challenging too.