2 Landscapes C&C

Ricky91t

Yeah well I'm crap at landscapes, Never had the eye for them and always just seemed to get snapshots which were too cluttered.

Anyway, Yesterday I took these two, the first @70mm and the second@100mm well there of there about.

So I'd like some critical C&C on them, I know the colours in the first are a bit over the top, But I'm running out the door now so I'll change it later.

Anyway be as brutal as possible, I want to learn from this, And if you're just gonna post saying 'These do nothing for me' try to explain why





Thanks!

AnimalRights

Landscapes are my achilles heel too.
Morriseee would be ideal for C&C on these.

#1
I don't think it works in portrait form and would be better as a er landscape, especially to have more empty space either side of that big hill/mountain.
and would the sea really be that blue? It looks totally unnatural (I know what you said)

#2
More like a snap as you referred too, very very flat, needs a far better PP, also the landscape itself containing the hills/slopes seem very er, like their behind some fine cloud, behind a film, maybe they were too distant to shoot, or maybe try a higher f number, there's just no detail in them.

dazftw

1st is perfect in portrait. You got the windy road to the lighthouse which is great for the composition. I don't know why you would want empty space on either side of the mountain in landscape?

That bush is very distracting though.

2nd is nice nothing great though everyone takes photos like that.

Kbeg3

Like the 1st one but as dazftw said the bush is distracting

Not to keen on the second one

sunny2004

First one is a portrait so you got that right and I know the spot..
the grass bottom right needs to go...
Contrast and saturation adjustment..
Nice location, and well done..

Second one is a great shot also, nothing really to add..

My speciality is Landscapes..

Freddie59

Nice shots. No. 2 my favourite. Valentia.....what a canvas.:)

Ricky91t

Thanks all for your comments!
This is the original photo with the bush partially removed..

The colours seem very dead in this..

Xiney

the cloning is very obvious in this new version of the first image - and the colours are hazy looking, as you said.

to be honest I'd say that no amount of processing is going to rid you of that bush properly - you would have had to notice it while you were there and changed your positioning to keep it out of the frame.


I rather like the second image though. It's a very calming image, and the colours are striking. I've seen photographers peddling worse

Ricky91t

Xiney wrote: »

the cloning is very obvious in this new version of the first image - and the colours are hazy looking, as you said.

to be honest I'd say that no amount of processing is going to rid you of that bush properly - you would have had to notice it while you were there and changed your positioning to keep it out of the frame.


I rather like the second image though. It's a very calming image, and the colours are striking. I've seen photographers peddling worse

Thanks,
It was a five minute job and I might spend more time on it at some point, Sadly I couldn't change my position as I was using the car door as my "tripod" because at f/8 I was only getting 1/125 or about that..

May do some more over the summer months...

Edit:
I also have this:


But I think with the lighting on the images it's not gonna look any bit decent.

trishw78

AnimalRights wrote: »

Landscapes are my achilles heel too.
Morriseee would be ideal for C&C on these.

#1
I don't think it works in portrait form and would be better as a er landscape, especially to have more empty space either side of that big hill/mountain.
and would the sea really be that blue? It looks totally unnatural (I know what you said)

Yes the sea can be that blue off the coast of Ireland.

Kbeg3 wrote: »

Like the 1st one but as dazftw said the bush is distracting

Not to keen on the second one

I like the first one but as someone else has pointed out the bush in the front is distracting so I'd crop that out. The Green scrub/grass seems a little washed out maybe that has to do with the time of day. If your shooting landscapes 'magic-hour' is the time to do it. i.e. anytime from sunrise till 10am-ish or from 5pm-ish till sunset. These time are quess-timates it's all dependant on what time of the year you have.

That said I do like the shots.

daycent

Nice shots.

In number 1 you could maybe crop out the bottom piece of land completely. Scroll down covering that part and you'll see what I mean, looks good to me anyway. Also the blues of the sea look a bit much as mentioned already. The sky could co with a little more detail. If you're using Lightroom using the grad function would work really well. Bring down exposure, up saturation etc.

I like 2 a lot (don't know what AR is looking at!). There's not much I would change, maybe some sharpening and the horizon looks a tiny bit off. I like the crop a lot.

AnimalRights

aaahhh as I said Landscapes I know SFA on....I can see the portrait use for the 1st pic now, but I'd still like it wider.

#2 I stand by my original comment, I did learn something interesting from the thread and that was Trisha's comments about best time to shoot to avoid the washed out look.

Ricky91t

I messed with a few setting in LR and got this...

Any better?


It's quite hard trying to bring the life back into the photo without over doing it!

trishw78

I wouldn't crop the sky out... Those out of focus twigs are bothering me. Like you said if you get back with a tripod, you'll be able to set it up better. don't be afraid to physical remove them if you have to.

Ricky91t

trishw78 wrote: »

I wouldn't crop the sky out... Those out of focus twigs are bothering me. Like you said if you get back with a tripod, you'll be able to set it up better. don't be afraid to physical remove them if you have to.

OK, I've removed that, It was quite annoying!

And the chances of me getting back there any time soon are slim :pac:

artyeva

portrait completely works for shot 1, i can't think of a single instance where you would look at that view and how your eye moves through vertically through the frame and think that it would look better in landscape to have more empty space either side of that big hill/mountain!!!

sorry animalrights but seriously - when i read that i spat out half a mouthful of tea on me monitor!!!!

i see what you say bout the washed out-ed-ness ricky but in fairness it's only really the top of the mountain and the shadow on the bottom bit of it. did you have a polarising filter on? that helps me sometimes if i can't manage to get the shot in the golden hour.

LeoB

I really like #1. Beautiful scene. Where is it?

It has everything you would like to have of a weekend trip to the western seaboard.

Morrisseeee

^^ LeoB, its Valencia Island in Co. Kerry, you can drive onto the island via a bridge.

Jebus, I better give my 2 cents now after AR's comments !! (I am an expert afterall............not ). Nice work with the pics, but I suppose the bush at the bottom of the 1st is a distraction, I think portrait works best as the scene naturally flows from the bottom of the pic to the top, but maybe a slightly different view or different lighting conditions, but thats hard if you don't live near this wonderful place. Its very similar to this version, here (from the master!!) which is near perfection, and one of the 1st photographs that really inspired me. I took a slightly different view, not on top of the mountain, and messed around with a bit of processing :

Nebezpeci Mys

Looking at both pix for a while...no.1 is perfect as a portrait but the bush in the bottom definitely ruins it; also it may do either with a crop to change the composition a little or when you go there next time you might try to take the shot from a bit different angle, zoom in bit more, etc. Like the colours, and the landscape - it just appears to sit 'uncomfortably' in the frame...

No. 2 has lovely colours in the sky but that's about it. As much as I'm a sucker for sunset/clouds/sun shots (also struggle with them a lot), this one doesn't do it for me. Hope I'm not too brutally honest now...:(

the_monkey

1st one for me is the best, really like the vibrance even if the sea is a bit too blue.

Pity about the bush would have been perfect if it wasn't there.

I like 2 aswell, nice shot, don't know why people are saying it's
soft, i doubt it would be much more detailed to be honest even
with a higher f number

sensibleken

what do you use for post processing?

for #1 if you have photoshop try using a gradiant mask to darken the sky but not the foreground. this might work, im not sure what other programes have this

also if your doing more landscapes it might be woth investing in a polarizer filter

Ricky91t

Hi all,
Thanks for all the comments and I will get round to replying(tomorrow!) just a bit busy with tests,
For those of you that haven't noticed the latest edit of the photo is posted here!