Silky water

Ernicus · May 19, 2012

Not my official "take 2 thread" still going through the day's hundreds of shots. I kinda liked this one and wanted to share and get feedback...

I'm guessing its way better than my first one...hoping I got a few more decent ones today.

f/36.0 2.5s (have not browsed through to the long exposures I shot yet)

Don't let my excitement hinder honesty..you won't hurt my feelings and I need real feedback as I want to do well. Thanks.

Jaemie · May 19, 2012

I like the silky water, but the trees seem to distract my eye and the sky has exposure issues. There is a lot to look at, perhaps too much. I think this would work better if you focused on a particular rock or something interesting and used the smooth water as foreground/background and minimized the trees somehow. Sorry - that's a lot to change I guess.

Ernicus · May 19, 2012

as I go through them, they all look very busy. I captured the water nice, as in softness of it, but the compositions on them all kinda suck. My longer exposures are blurry too...which is disappointing. I guess my tripod sucks and got some wiggle, I used 10 sec timer and was nowhere near touching camera so it wasnt me. lol

Robin Usagani · May 19, 2012

This is my take.. if the water wasnt silky, do you think it is a good photo? I dont think the silky water is adding much. Your first priority is to get a better scene to shoot. I just feel like that scenery isnt that beautiful.

Jaemie · May 19, 2012

What ISO?

Robin Usagani · May 20, 2012

I assumed you didnt use an ND filter? You wont have that good of image quality when you use aperture that small.

Ernicus · May 20, 2012

No, I don't have any filters yet. Just me and my camera and my wal mart tripod for now.

Good point on the water vs scenery take.

I am unhappy with local scenery, I have not posted any landscapes, which I love to take, 'cause they all suck. The tree lines are ugly, busy, and also seem washed out and out of focus a lot. I need to practice more because I am taking a trip to Bar Harbor soon where there is beautiful scenery to shoot.

Ernicus · May 20, 2012

I'll grab some of one of the "nicer" areas i think that is local, can't drive too far tomorrow; so I can get some feedback if I am doing something wrong on my landscapes or if it's just ugly scenery. I'll do it early morning timeframe.

Ernicus · May 22, 2012

Just wanted to update this thread after this mornings shoots. I find it kinda funny how much I was stressing trying to get silky water seeing it through noob eyes. Thanks again to those who assisted me while learning.

What I learned today, if you go out under the right conditions, you don't even have to try. I achieved it with just getting proper exposure for the shot. The silky water was not even a goal. lol.