Luminous Landscape Forum
The Art of Photography => User Critiques => Topic started by: Hans Kruse on March 01, 2009, 10:12:54 am
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I recently added a new homepage and have uploaded a selection of my landscape photography. It would be great to get some feedback on this gallery http://hanskrusephotography.com/gallery/69...448447330_jLo8J (http://hanskrusephotography.com/gallery/6999416_4GuXj#448447330_jLo8J)
You can use the slide show feature to look through the gallery and the images will automatically be resized to the size of you screen up to a resolution of about a 24" screen. I have limited the resolution being displayed to this size.
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Very nice, and very different. Outstanding work. The slideshow really works well. The only other comment I have is in some of the first few images, the shadows or overall contrast made the images a bit too dark. It could be my monitor doesn't have enough DR, but others who view the slides will see the same.
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A stunning body of work! I looked at every picture in the Landscapes gallery, and almost all moved me.
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Beautiful galleries, congratulations Hans.
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Hans,
You seem to have a way to use natural light to emphasize textures that is exceptional! Bravo, and keep up the good work,
- Christos
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Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous photos! Some of the best I've seen in a long time. They remind me a lot of the work of Charlie Waite, one of the few photographers whose work I get excited about.
Just one question, if you don't mind...Number 31 in your landscape gallery (with mountains in the background and an orchard in the foreground)...what mountains are those? I don't recognize them, but now I want to go there.
Lisa
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I enjoyed paging through all the images. My only suggestion would be to edit them down to about 30 or 40 - you have at least that many "wow" images but the impact of the portfolio overall is diminished by the inclusion of the other 60 or 70 images that are "only" very good.
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Very nice, and very different. Outstanding work. The slideshow really works well. The only other comment I have is in some of the first few images, the shadows or overall contrast made the images a bit too dark. It could be my monitor doesn't have enough DR, but others who view the slides will see the same.
Thanks a lot. I agree that the contrast is making the dark parts of the these first images were a bit high and I decided to go back and readjust. This was easy to do since all was done in Lightroom 2.x with local adjustments. The first photo is
(http://hanskruse.smugmug.com/photos/448447330_jLo8J-L-3.jpg)
The second I adjusted is this one
(http://hanskruse.smugmug.com/photos/452392813_VK6KY-L-1.jpg)
For this one I wanted it to look like a darkish Italian oil painting. But reviewing it again I found that it could do with a little more light, so it was adjusted and reloaded.
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hey, i'm really enjoying your style.. very slick.
what were your post-process techniques? how did you give them all that oil-on-canvas type of look? naturally it starts with the correct time to take the picture (golden hour...) but what other techniques, programs, and know-how did you use ?
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Thanks a lot. I agree that the contrast is making the dark parts of the these first images were a bit high and I decided to go back and readjust. This was easy to do since all was done in Lightroom 2.x with local adjustments. The first photo is
(http://hanskruse.smugmug.com/photos/448447330_jLo8J-L-3.jpg)
The second I adjusted is this one
(http://hanskruse.smugmug.com/photos/452392813_VK6KY-L-1.jpg)
For this one I wanted it to look like a darkish Italian oil painting. But reviewing it again I found that it could do with a little more light, so it was adjusted and reloaded.
Yep, you've got your procedures down just right. Good work.
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Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous photos! Some of the best I've seen in a long time. They remind me a lot of the work of Charlie Waite, one of the few photographers whose work I get excited about.
Just one question, if you don't mind...Number 31 in your landscape gallery (with mountains in the background and an orchard in the foreground)...what mountains are those? I don't recognize them, but now I want to go there.
Lisa
Thanks Lisa, This image is from northern Spain from the Pyrenees. I don't have the exact location as my GPS had been misplaced. The last position before I went further north is here
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=42.21553833,...752319&z=11 (http://maps.google.com/maps?q=42.21553833,0.04107167&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=42.325047,-0.10849&spn=0.663006,1.752319&z=11)
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I enjoyed paging through all the images. My only suggestion would be to edit them down to about 30 or 40 - you have at least that many "wow" images but the impact of the portfolio overall is diminished by the inclusion of the other 60 or 70 images that are "only" very good.
Hi Tim,
Thanks and good point. It's a tough thing to do, but worth it. The current selection came from several invitations from photo clubs to talk about my photography.
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Hi Tim,
Thanks and good point. It's a tough thing to do, but worth it. The current selection came from several invitations from photo clubs to talk about my photography.
Exceptional work.
JMR
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I enjoyed paging through all the images. My only suggestion would be to edit them down to about 30 or 40 - you have at least that many "wow" images but the impact of the portfolio overall is diminished by the inclusion of the other 60 or 70 images that are "only" very good.
Hans,
I am 100% aligned with Tim here, you have some very nice images here, but others are either too similar of lacking impact a little.
I am just going through a very similar process at the moment, and understand very well the difficulty of editing, but it is a must do task.
Cheers,
Bernard
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Thanks for the map, Hans. I've never been to the Pyrenees; I will add it to my list of places to go sometime.
Lisa
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Beautiful work. Thanks for sharing.
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hey, i'm really enjoying your style.. very slick.
what were your post-process techniques? how did you give them all that oil-on-canvas type of look? naturally it starts with the correct time to take the picture (golden hour...) but what other techniques, programs, and know-how did you use ?
Hi Mike,
Most of the images were edited using Lightroom 2.x (at the moment 2.3RC) and I use the local adjustment tools quite a bit. The graduated filter is a godsend for me as well as the brush tool. These tools makes it really unncessary for me to use Photoshop. I do use Photoshop CS3 from time to time when I use tone mapping. But that is now much more seldom now given the Lightroom 2.x tools. I can get a similar effect (as with tone mapping) that I like sometimes using the fill light and recovery towards compensating tone curve adjustments and graduated filters when I need certain parts of the image to fall into the number of stops that can be represented on a screen or a print. I also now use the Lightroom 2.x camera curves under camera calibration. I use the landscape tone curve a lot and I really like it. I use the vibrance on a moderate level and no saturation. I also use HDR techniques rather seldom. I find the that the number of stops available from the 1Ds mk3 (and my former 5D) is typically enough when using the adjustment techniques mentioned. But there are cases where this is not enough, though.
But as you say the most important thing is choosing the light and time of day. I'm typically out before sunrise and often before twilight time starts and stop shooting 1-2 hours after sunrise depending the time of year. I'm most happy when the weather forecast says sun, rain and cloudy at the same time
Many thanks for your comments.
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A stunning body of work! I looked at every picture in the Landscapes gallery, and almost all moved me.
Hi Dan, thanks very much for you comments! Much appreciated.
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Beautiful galleries, congratulations Hans.
Hi Francois,
Thanks very much.
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Hans,
You seem to have a way to use natural light to emphasize textures that is exceptional! Bravo, and keep up the good work,
- Christos
Thanks Christos, I always look for the light and go out early in the day, but also scout areas when there is dramatic weather in the middle of the day. Especially in Italy where many of the images are from, the mountains are just fantastic and the weather changes constantly. I sometimes call is action photography since it cahnges so fast!
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Yep, you've got your procedures down just right. Good work.
Hi Dale,
Thanks a lot.
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Hans,
I am 100% aligned with Tim here, you have some very nice images here, but others are either too similar of lacking impact a little.
I am just going through a very similar process at the moment, and understand very well the difficulty of editing, but it is a must do task.
Cheers,
Bernard
Hi Bernard,
Beatiful images on your site. The biggest pain for me was to narrow my selection down to the number presented. Now that I have gone through these several times, I wonder if my selection was actually the right one
So I will have to revise that and also narrow it down further. But I agree that it is now only a needed but also rather good process to go through.
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39 IS GOD.
Elby
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You have added lots of great work to your portfolio, Hans! I really enjoyed the images and am happy to see that you've been busy with your camera over the last couple of years. Thanks for sharing them.
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Hard to say much more... Gorgeous images, really!
I was also moved to see in the first page my 2 formers italian holidays (Toscana -or not far, Emilia Romagna?-, and Abbruzi - I got almost the same framing from a Campo Imperatore view, but without such a good light).
As said, the landscape gallery could even improve with a bit of editing down to 1 or 2 pages... Tough work indeed.
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39 IS GOD.
Elby
Thanks Elby, I also find this one of my best.
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You have added lots of great work to your portfolio, Hans! I really enjoyed the images and am happy to see that you've been busy with your camera over the last couple of years. Thanks for sharing them.
Hi Bret,
Long time no see! Thanks for your comments and I have been very busy. I have just returned from Lima in Peru from a 3 week shooting. Something like walking in the footsteps of the painter Enrique Polanco http://www.enriquepolanco.com/ (http://www.enriquepolanco.com/).
I may post a message about that later on.
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Hard to say much more... Gorgeous images, really!
I was also moved to see in the first page my 2 formers italian holidays (Toscana -or not far, Emilia Romagna?-, and Abbruzi - I got almost the same framing from a Campo Imperatore view, but without such a good light).
As said, the landscape gallery could even improve with a bit of editing down to 1 or 2 pages... Tough work indeed.
Hi Nicolas,
Tuscany was great, but I was surprised to see how small an area that is really worth while photographing when we speak about landscapes. Abruzzo is in my view one of the larger oversigts in terms of photographic beauty. I'm so amazed by this area that has so many fantastic views within a fairly small area. Especially Gran Sasso.
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Hi Mike,
Most of the images were edited using Lightroom 2.x (at the moment 2.3RC) and I use the local adjustment tools quite a bit. The graduated filter is a godsend for me as well as the brush tool. These tools makes it really unncessary for me to use Photoshop. I do use Photoshop CS3 from time to time when I use tone mapping. But that is now much more seldom now given the Lightroom 2.x tools. I can get a similar effect (as with tone mapping) that I like sometimes using the fill light and recovery towards compensating tone curve adjustments and graduated filters when I need certain parts of the image to fall into the number of stops that can be represented on a screen or a print. I also now use the Lightroom 2.x camera curves under camera calibration. I use the landscape tone curve a lot and I really like it. I use the vibrance on a moderate level and no saturation. I also use HDR techniques rather seldom. I find the that the number of stops available from the 1Ds mk3 (and my former 5D) is typically enough when using the adjustment techniques mentioned. But there are cases where this is not enough, though.
But as you say the most important thing is choosing the light and time of day. I'm typically out before sunrise and often before twilight time starts and stop shooting 1-2 hours after sunrise depending the time of year. I'm most happy when the weather forecast says sun, rain and cloudy at the same time
Many thanks for your comments.
Thanks!! I've been working in LR2.x for a while now, and I'm working with both the basic sliders as well as the curve sliders. It is too bad that the program takes so much CPU and RAM power to run, it brings my machine to its knees when I do local edits.
I enjoyed the explenation on the HDR and vibrance info, I was wondering about that! also interesting is your comment on the DR of the 5D and 1DsIII. I'm working with a 30D and I sometimes find myself wanting a bit more shadow and highlight room, but I usually just think its my errors... i'm beginning to wonder if it is the sensor DR in the 30D. I've wanted to upgrade to the 5DII, but have had a bit of trouble really qualifying the need, maybe this is another reason (). any thoughts on the validity of that?
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Thanks!! I've been working in LR2.x for a while now, and I'm working with both the basic sliders as well as the curve sliders. It is too bad that the program takes so much CPU and RAM power to run, it brings my machine to its knees when I do local edits.
I enjoyed the explenation on the HDR and vibrance info, I was wondering about that! also interesting is your comment on the DR of the 5D and 1DsIII. I'm working with a 30D and I sometimes find myself wanting a bit more shadow and highlight room, but I usually just think its my errors... i'm beginning to wonder if it is the sensor DR in the 30D. I've wanted to upgrade to the 5DII, but have had a bit of trouble really qualifying the need, maybe this is another reason (). any thoughts on the validity of that?
Hi Mike,
If you look at he measurements from DxO Labs here http://www.dxomark.com/index.php/eng/Image.../(brand2)/Canon (http://www.dxomark.com/index.php/eng/Image-Quality-Database/Compare-cameras/(appareil1)/179|0/(appareil2)/305|0/(onglet)/0/(brand)/Canon/(brand2)/Canon) and even if you click on print you will at most see a one stop difference.
The biggest reason for upgrading to the 5D mk2 over the 30D would in my opinion be the larger resolution and the better detail, sharpness, noise characteristics when printing at the same size. You may also find that the AF system in the 5D mk2 is better than the 30D. The 30D has the same AF system as the 20D and when I upgraded 3 years ago from the 20D to the 5D I found that the AF system was more precise and since the 5D mk2 has the same AF hardware but better software handling of AF I would expect that you would see a visibly better AF system in the 5D mk2. You need to be more careful when you are shooting with the5D mk2 to get the details sharp (looking at 100%) so that you can enjoy the details in very large prints. The live view on the 5D mk2 (as I use a lot on the 1Ds mk3) will help you to get absolute critical focus where you want it when using a tripod. There is a real difference between shooting with and without a tripod using the high resolution sensors except when having fast shutter speeds.
Having said all this, I believe you can achive much more DR in your images than you thought available when using the local editing tools of Lightroom to darken and brighten certain areas of your photos even from the 30D (use the graduated filters and if you haven't then take a look at the tutorials from LL on Lightroom 2, it's worth it!). But clearly the images from the 5D mk2 will be more forgiving since there are so many more pixels to give your final image. Going from 8MP to 21MP is a big step and I can't see how you would regret it. If you are unsure try to rent og lend a 5D mk2 from one of your friends. But not just for DR reasons.
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as i've been lusting over that camera, I've seen much of the DxO and whatnot reports on the 5D.... although its nice to hear that the AF is superior. the croppability, IQ and noise are really what i look forward to the most. I've used the live view to get manual focusing down, and i found that to do a huge asset, makes shooting low DOF much easier.
as for LR, i need to upgrade my hardware before I will have enough patience for the local editing tools. I do however use photoshop on occasion for local edits, but find that with lightroom doing 85% of what i want to do, it is a real pain to transfer between programs for many different shots. I did buy the LL camera to print, and the LR 2.0 guide vids, very informative indeed.