I'm not doing B&W too often, to be honest, and even more rarely with landscapes. But this scene asked for it in many ways (pretty flat light during early morning hours, great contrast between flowing water and rest of the frame). I went for pretty aggressive post, so I might go too far. Here's my questions, if you want to take time to answer them:
How many subjects would you say are in the frame? (a number)
What is it / what are they (if the answer for the previous question is higher than one)?
Are there any distractions that constantly pull you off the main subject(s)?
And last - less technical - do you like it? :D It would be great if you could also say "why", at least in few words. I would be very grateful for your input, as I feel stuck with this image and I'm not sure if it's done, or needs to be done once again from scratch. ;)
Oh, and more thing - it's best to view it on black background, as it's very dark.
I hope I can answer this helpfully:
I suppose I would count the waterfall and the lagoon as the main subjects. The one this that keeps drawing my eye away from the waterfall and lagoon is the tree trunk on the upper left side of the frame, but it doesn't bother me that it's there :)
I really like it! It feels like a fine art piece. My only critique is that it maybe is a bit dark, but instead of lifting shadows all around maybe just punch in some more highlights in the water if that makes sense?
I think your framing is really beautiful and I can feel the movement of the water.
Hi Natasha! Thank you very much for your response. As you noticed, my intention was to make a waterfall and a pool my main subject, with a small secondary subject on the left (the tree with brighter steps-like branches) to balance my composition. I feel that without anything interesting to the left it started to weigh more on the right side. But, as others also pointed out, I might have overdone that one. ;) As for darkness - I’m working with new monitor which apparently is VERY bright (I’m working on the lowest settings possible) so I still need to figure out what looks good on other screens. I’ll definitely look at brightness level while doing a re-run on this image (I feel that it needs a complete face-lifting, not just correcting minor details). Also, thank you for your comment on composition. I’ll post new version of it when it’s finished. I’ll tag you so can take a look on a new version, if you’d like it and find the time.
I really appreciate all your thoughts!
totally understand the screen dilemma! I don't have any of my screens calibrated, so I am constantly comparing my images on 2 different laptop screens and my cellphone to come up with something that works on everything.
Your work is beautiful! I think you will quickly get the hang of B&W. Looking forward to seeing your new edit!
composition is nice, it's a bit aggressive on contrast the darks are really dark even off the white screen. Did you edit like you normally would then convert or edit in B&W? right now my eye only goes to a few spots tree far left 2 trees up top then coming down the falls. Other than that i like it a lot.
Hi Joseph! Good to „see” you again! How are you these days? :) I was vaguely familiar with the brightness issues but not to their full extent. Now I see I have to work more cautiously with my „zones”, as my screen is far to bright for standard viewing (and not calibrated, unfortunatelly). I’m working on its lowest setting and it’s still little to bright. I’ll pay more attention to this while doing a full re-run on this one. ;) The B&W conversion happened pretty quickly in my workflow - later on I worked mostly on selective D&B, but I wasn’t sure about it - hence this post. ;) Thank you also for the subjects identification - it’s basically what I was aiming for, but I see I need to be more subtle with my luminosity levels. ;) I’ll post new version of & tag you so can take a look at it, if you’d like it and find the time.
Im good just got a new camera for my birthday will hopefully have some shots on here by next week
That's awesome! What's your new lightsaber? :D (Also - All the best for you! :) )
Z6
Sweet! :D Can't wait for new shots from you! :)
Hi Andrzej - interesting questions you pose, about an interesting image!
Firstly, I find your question about the number of subjects a bit odd, and hard to answer. I'm puzzled as to why you ask. I guess I'd say ONE, a waterfall. The tree top left draws the eye, but also provides a containing element at the top left edge of the image i.e. my reaction seems to be much like Natasha's. The tree then starts a movement of my gaze to those delicate ribbons of water at the very top of the fall, then down the fall to the pool, and so on.
I do like it, as a very stylised image - but it is very dark, as others say! There's a slightly unreal quality to it, as if it's a light-painted night scene. or the pool is radioactive, or something...! I've played with it myself, and find that doing what Natasha suggests makes it look even more unreal. Your excellent portfolio shows a flair for a classy kind of drama, which could be said to characterise this image.
I agree with Natasha about your excellent composition.
I'd keep it as is, AND start again, to come up with a different rendition. Perhaps, being unused to B&W, you've done what we all do, and processed until you're disorientated, which is not to say you've come up with a bad result. I often keep several versions of images.
I wish more posts were as interesting as this one of yours. Na razie.
Hi Chris! Thank you for your comment! As for the subject(s) matter - as you probably noticed by comments of the others, some see more than one main subject. And it’s perfectly fine to see only one, or even four or more. I was interested in how many places in the frame catch someone’s eye, and what are they. If they match with my intensions - I made it properly. But if more people would start pointing out to some uninteresting part of the frame - I would need to reconsider it. As you and Natasha pointed out - there’s a small secondary subject to the left, which was indeed my intention - I wanted to balance the frame which was rather empty on the left side.
As for the brightness - I think I might have too bright screen, which made me edit it so darkly. I’ll do a re-run and pay more attention to brightness levels.
I’m also super excited about one thing you mentioned - the unreal / radioactive quality of the pool. As I was post-processing the image I started to see the water in the pool slightly different from the other parts of the image - it started to look as it was glowing light from within, so I tried to enhance that quality. I will work on it more, as I really like it. ;) I’ll take your advice and do a full re-run of post-processing. I remember (painfully) doing up to five these kind of full re-runs on one of my most complex images, but with every one of them I was closer to what I wanted and got the faster and faster. Also, thank you for your kind words about my composition and some other works - I really appreciate it! Dzięki! ;)
Aa - rozumiem!
Proszę bardzo. Nie ma za co. ;-)
(= Ah - I understand. You're welcome.)
I really enjoy this photo. I am not at all opposed to exaggerated dark as long as there is still detail that can be pulled out. Other than the very top margin there is detail in the entire frame.
As for subjects I see 4. The way I choose this is by how many times my eyes stopped to examine more detail. The first and second are the upper cascades and the plunge pool. The third is the "chute". The 4th is the hash mark looking bushes or cascading rocks in the upper left. I keep getting pulled to these.I examined them closer thinking they were a natural step formation or something.
What impressed me the most was the shutter speed you used to capture the flow perfectly. Not too grainy, not too smooth. The small cascade falls on top are, in my opinion, perfectly defined.
Very well done! I think a little more dodge in the upper margin and maybe either burn the hash mark feature in the upper left or dodge the general area around it so the hash feature is less isolated and it's done!!
I wanted to take advantage of almost all the „zones” (maybe without pure white), but I feared that I might overdone some spots. Thank you for pointing out the top part of the frame. It’s a least interesting bit IMO, but I’ll try to work around that another way than going full black. Also - my screen seems to be little to bright, which may caused more darkness in the image, than I would like to. I really like the concept of stopping the eye around the frame as a tool for identifying subjects. As you mentioned - there’s a tree in the upper left which I kept brighter as another subject, filling the left part of the frame. I felt that without it the composition was unbalanced (heavily tilted to the right) so I decided to keep it, although I might have overdone it. I’ll give the image a full re-run and post it here again. I’ll tag you, so you can check it again, if you like. Thank you very much for your input!
I see one subject: an hourglass formed by nature. I like it a lot! Only think if you could figure out how to make it look even more natural real life looking without taking away the focus from that hourglass image. I dont know how to do that. Maybe a little more light on the surroundings?
I also had some thoughts about hourglass, when I first saw it. It even went on in my mind, leading to other connections and imaginations, like for example: whale’s tail. ;) I’m still think about this image and I decided to give it a full re-run in post-processing to enhance some features in more natural way. I also see that my screen is a bit to bright so I have to compensate for this during my session - otherwise it will come to dark again.
Thank you for your thoughts!
Hi Andrrzej, I somewhat agree with others, but find the shadow detail looks a lot better blown up.
I think if you could raise the shadows a little on the cliff walls it would help the eye move through the frame better.
You could possibly try to add more highlight detail on the fall itself as it is a little flat in the mid-section.
Otherwise the composition and interpretation are solid.
Hi Alan!
Thank you very much for your input. I really value your thoughts, as your photographs speak for you more than anything else. I admire them and I took a liberty to follow you here. :)
As for brightness / darkness of the image - I think it’s my super-bright screen - I’ll have to compensate for that more during my re-run session. I’ll decided to do it all over again and focus on the parts that everyone here mentioned.
As for the flatness of the middle section of the waterfall - did you mean „middle of the frame” or rather midtones?
Thanks again for all your thoughts!
Thanks Andrzej, I am humbled by your following.
I was actually speaking of the middle section of the waterfall itself. Not a major point but if you could add some highlight at the top where the water falls into the narrowest part of the falls I think it might add a little more interest to that section.
not a big deal by any means but perhaps worth trying if you are looking at options to improve.
Now I see what you mean - thank you for that hint. I'm doing a new version as we speak. ;)
Here's my two cents: In reading your responses to other posts, I'd say that you should use the histogram to edit instead of your eyes. What I mean by that is, if your screen is so bright that you don't trust yourself to make adjustments of overall tonality, then using and understanding the histogram is your best bet.
I've attached the histogram of your posted image and one with some curves applied. I used a subtle bump in the shadows to bring up the definition of the dark areas of your photo (but I can only do so much with a previously-edited JPEG original). In my version, you can see the shadow detail a bit better, but my heavy-handed adjustment does show the vignette that can't be fixed without an original file. I hope this helps a little.
Hi Philip,
I think a suggestion for using histogram more is a good one. Most of my pixels will always be to the left side with this type of images, but I'll try using it more consciously. :)
And I like your edit - I'll try to work more on the darks / shadows section with my new edit. :)
OK, here's the new edit. I made it much simpler than the previous one, with less aggressive processing. I also hope that it's little brighter than the last time (it is on my screen ;) ).
I enhanced features of the waterfall (upper, mid and lower section) little more (by bringing mids and highlights up and using more contrast) and did "less obvious" attempt to balance frame with the tree in the left part of the frame.
I'm curious what you think about it now!
Natasha Weedman joseph cole Chris Jablonski Brian Gayley Amos Roy Alan Brown Deleted User
Hi Anrrzej, this is a great improvement. The water has so much more depth (excuse the pun) and I now find my eye wandering further through the frame and finding interest.
Great work!
BTW - if you choose to edit the post you can add as a second image - just a handy tip someone passed on to me some time ago.
Thanks Alan! I've edited the post and attached second image below the first one. I really like puns so no problem there. ;)
I'm glad you see it as an improvement. My initial fear was that the surroundings of the waterfall were so cluttered and chaotic, that it would distract viewer from the main subjects. Not sure how it works right now, with more details exposed...
Hi Andrzej! Wonderful edit! the whites in the waterfall are punchier and draw my eye along the waterfalls into the lagoon. They are clearly the focus of the composition. My eye travels around the image pleasantly, and I don't find the surroundings cluttered at all as you mentioned above.
Beautiful work!
Thanks, Natasha! Appreciate your feedback very much. :)
Hi Andrzej! This image is better, somehow more relaxed - not a word I'd usually use. I think the first (with your different "subjects") seemed to have competing zones compared to this, which has more of a flow around the whole frame.
It still is very dark! To my eye, the contrast between the water and the rest is somewhat disconcertingly high, but that may reflect my expecting to see "a photo" on this forum, rather than an art image. Nothing wrong with a stylised image per se. Printed and framed, I think it would work best in series of similarly toned images. On its own, or in your portfolio, it would look like the odd one out.
But keep doing what you're doing! A series would be interesting, especially as you have a motif or atmosphere in mind. Very imaginative.
Thanks, Chris!
I can relate to the more relaxed feeling of this frame. Before, it was almost like putting a spotlight on particular subjects - right know the light is more even. At least I hope it is. ;)
I know it is still very dark - it was, after all, my initial intention. I tried to publish this image in a dedicated "B&W Fine Art Landscape" group, but it's absolutely dead IMO. I got plenty of responses here, for which I am grateful. :)
Sine I have a thing for running water, and I can photograph it for hours, I may as well do the full series of these. Consider it first of its kind. ;)
Yes, do that. I'd be interested to see the results. For some reason, the fact that this is a "straight" landscape, and yet in some senses not, makes it curiously hard to assess. You could probably also post it in the Minimalism, Abstract, Experimental Group which is more "adventurous".