From a cloud to this. In the two month's I've had my DSLR I think I've learned a lot. The cloud I posted yesterday was shot the first day I had my camera. This shot was taken last week and edited today. What do you think? Did I crop out too much sky? The only editing I've done is removed the distractions... cars, signs, etc. I'm including the original just for perspective. Could I do something better? Happy to receive CC. Thanks.
I would cropped like this, in square. Anyway, the photo is out of focus...
I know it's not the most innovative composition but in landscapes I rarely break from putting the horizon on the lower or upper line of thirds. Basically lower third if the sky is interesting, upper third if the ground/foreground is interesting. The classics are classic for a reason and I'm very much an amateur :)
So for this composition I would prefer the horizon a little higher in the frame. From the original it looks like you were avoiding having the highway in the shot so maybe this location wouldn't have allowed it. If you're shooting with the kit lens I believe it'll be a zoom. If you zoomed tight in on that bluff/cliff in the distance maybe you could have avoided the highway, been a bit more flexible with the composition, and also focused on the most interesting part of the image (in my opinion).
I apologize to Elizabeth, but I feel to have explain why I chose this composition - crop. If you put a little emphasis on processing, then it came to a full impact.