Hey everyone, if you rate this lower than a 3 I would love to hear why. Be as blunt as you'd like - Always room for improvement!
Critique the Community
Landscape Photography
With Elia Locardi
Submit your best landscape photos for a chance to win a free Fstoppers tutorial.
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It's a good 3-3.5 for me. There are 2 little things for me that could be improved.
My eye keeps jumping to the bright red underside of the rock on the right that could be toned down just a little bit.
And the plateau on the left/middle left isn't sharp properly. This could either be due to compression or just depth of field in which case on focus stacking would help i guess.
I agree about the underside of the arch. I'll try and tone it down some. It's such a weird spot because as the sun hits the spot, it actually hits the underside of the arch first. I went back and forth on the lighting for this for quite some time.
As for the focus. I think there is definitely some softness in that area but considering I already took the shot - I can't focus stack.
This is at 1:1
https://imgur.com/a/IGI8OZo
Disregard the colors being off, it's because I screenshotted.
It seems like it should be decently sharp. What do you think?
Toned down the light a bit and darkened the spot I assumed you were talking about. What do you think?
https://imgur.com/a/iHPBVmu
Oh yes that actually does look less distracting. And also that file looks sharper. I like it
Sharpness is actually the same, you just can see it at 2500px instead of the compressed size here :P
Thanks for the comments and suggestions! I've been battling this edit for months and honestly posted to here to see how it was received.
Yeah thats what i meant by "it looks" sharper ;)
No problem you commented on mine too and that's what a critique is for right
it seems a bit soft, unless you intended it that way.
It's possible my orton is a bit too strong. Unless you mean that things don't look to be in focus
I think thats it. It might be the orton effect.
Having seen an infinte number of photos of this scene, I'm definitely a fan of images that don't include the sunstar; or even the whole entirety of the arch. I think the framing here is nearly perfect. Having said that, I'm just not a fan of the glow effect, I think it has become too cliche. Just my personal opinion, of course, but I don't think such a rugged subject deserves the "soft focus / airbrush" treatment.
Out of curiosity, the edit I uploaded above ^, do you like the amount better or would prefer none at all?
Thanks for the compliments. I actually like this composition as a change from the norm a bit myself (not that it hasn't been taken).
I actually have a version with no glow as well that I had on my phone for almost a month. I dwell on edits for long periods of time. This one still doesn't feel finished honestly.
It's definitely extremely helpful for me too, to wait a few weeks or a month before deciding on the final edit. Very good tactic.
I like the other version a bit more, but I think that the shadows are getting a bit dark in that one too. I might massage the tones a bit, as opposed to applying any glow-y effects.
The thing that really stands out to me though, now having seen both versions of the image, is the fact that there just isn't light on the washer woman arch, or the airport tower. I wish that this shot had been captured just a few minutes later maybe, when the sun was finally touching those distant subjects as well. I have a version of this scene that I shot at 50mm, I don't know if I've uploaded it here to Fstoppers. It's not perfect either, but it does make me wonder what your moment would have looked like in another 5-15 minutes...
Well this is actually multiple moments, 10-15 minutes apart. That said there just wasn't a lot of light that day. Looking at the photos I have, even as the sun came over the horizon I think it hit some cloud/haze and never really lit up everything, especially those two in the back.
That said, I could easily put a little effort into highlighting them a little more so they aren't so dark.
To me, the haloing is distracting, and almost feels like the foreground is too hot, makes it feel unbalanced. Don't know if that's how it came out of camera or just the post processing.
I brought down the light a bit in a different edit, totally agree with you.
As for the colors/hotness. I struggle so much getting the colors of Utah correct. I have a shot of Bryce that I spent hours trying to "fix" the color. When the sunrise hits the canyon walls, it's so red/orange. I don't disagree with you here at all. I've exported this image at least 10 times JUST trying to get the color on the rocks natural. It's one of my biggest struggles with literally any sunrise in canyon areas.
https://imgur.com/a/7gYoAfz
Heres the main photo I used right out of camera except for white balance change, tiny shadow lift. Gives you an idea what the canyon wall colors look like.