Luminous Landscape Forum
The Art of Photography => User Critiques => Topic started by: seamus finn on April 28, 2014, 02:46:14 pm
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I usually don't post anything on the day I took it - maybe I should have stuck to that rule.
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As you know, Seamus, sometimes I make the same mistake.
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As you know, Seamus, sometimes I make the same mistake.
But at least I'm shooting, Russ, and for me, that's a bit of a redemption. As for the picture, it's a cliché, I suppose, but it gave me a buzz all the same. Next time I go out, I think I'll put up the LEARNER plate on my forehead, but maybe I should stick to street.
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Keep shooting, Seamus, and don't worry about critiques. It's just great to have you back on here.
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That's a fine landscape shot, Seamus.
Perhaps a touch of contrast/clarity to spice it up? Some vignetting? Grain? Or would that be too artsy-fartsy for your street/documentary credo? ;)
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That's a fine landscape shot, Seamus.
Perhaps a touch of contrast/clarity to spice it up? Some vignetting? Grain? Or would that be to artsy-fartsy for your street/documentary credo?
Thanks, SB, you've restored my faith in myself!.
The thing about the picture is that while it means very little to an international audience on this site, it means a lot locally, because it's near an old church which dates back to ancient times and a sacred monastic settlement. In fact, you can see the remains of the structure just above the left fencing in the picture, and then there's the iconic mountain, Ben Bulben - Ireland's equivalent of Table Mountain - beneath whose head lies buried the great poet, W. B. Yeats, much of whose work was inspired by the landscape in these here parts:
'Under bare Ben Bulben's head
In Drumcliff churchyard Yeats is laid.
An ancestor was rector there
Long years ago, a church stands near,
By the road an ancient cross.
No marble, no conventional phrase;
On limestone quarried near the spot
By his command these words are cut:
Cast a cold eye
On life, on death.
Horseman pass by!'
As for the artsy/fartsy technical aspects, gimmie that any time. The peculiar thing is that when I look at the image in Lightroom, it appears fine, but when I upload, it seems to go very flat. I tried a few times to add some sparkle, but obviously from where you're sitting, nothing doing although it's fine here. Maybe it's a monitor thing, and anyway, the light was terrible on the day.
What you said earlier about photographers and their raison d'etre is a true thing. I went out to the old church (it was quite a trek for the likes of me over rough terrain) and I got nothing, but on my way back, I discovered the fallen fence, and hey presto, serendipity! The great joy was to be out shooting again, and not knowing what lies around the next corner.
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I usually don't post anything on the day I took it - maybe I should have stuck to that rule.
Seamus,
I, for one, am delighted that you broke that habit (hardly a rule as such).
Photographs are NOT about photography but are about the world and all that resides therein.
Perhaps the reference to Yeats with the initial posting of the image may have added rather than detracted or distracted, and illuminated the reality for those who can't envisage beyond their own experiences.
Questions of snap and contrast cannot detract from the almost mythical aspects landscape in your neck of the woods.
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Yeats and Ben Bulben aside - it's a fine photograph.
As a critique... The darkened area near the top looks artificial (even if it is real) and the top is too closely cropped for the great feeling of space instroduced with the spread of the fence, but those are minor correctables to what is a fine photograph. I agree with Slobodan about the increase in contrast/clarity - make that grass sing!
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Terry summed it up nicely. An image that has good potential and should certainly not be doomed to the recycle bin. :)
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Any better?
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Much better. The color version appears way blurry though!?
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Thanks, SB. You were quick off the mark, fair play to you. I had just sent the thing when your response arrived.
Something has happened to my Lightroom Export settings so in the colour version it seems to have rendered a very small file, hence the blur - my fault entirely, so I've removed it. When I get the Lightroom settings sorted out, I'll post a colour version - just as a matter of interest.
The lesson from all this is: post in haste, as I did last night - repent at your leisure. .
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Just for the fun of it, here's the colour version.
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Interesting, Seamus. They're completely different photographs. The denotation is the same but the connotations actually change the subject.
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Interesting, Seamus. They're completely different photographs. The denotation is the same but the connotations actually change the subject.
Not only that, but they also require a different processing approach. While b&w called for more punch, color can do with much subtler rendering and still work. In that sense, the color version posted is a bit too saturated, to the point that the distant mountain shadow became cyan-ish and the green grass "bitingly" green.
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Not only that, but they also require a different processing approach. While b&w called for more punch, color can do with much subtler rendering and still work. In that sense, the color version posted is a bit too saturated, to the point that the distant mountain shadow became cyan-ish and the green grass "bitingly" green.
Agreed. When it comes to colour, I'm at a severe disadvantage -I find it a very difficult medium. At heart, I'm a bw guy, looking for shades between pure white somewhere in the picture, and pure black somewhere else in the print.
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As another B&W guy, I liked the original shot very much. I do think the newer cropping improves it, but at least on my monitor the revised B&W one looks a bit harsh, which spoils the lovely mood and feeling I get from the original. So I would much prefer the original but with the additional space at the top of the later revisions. The color is too much for my taste.
Great to see you posting again. Please show us more, even if you think they might be "mistakes."
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Any better?
thats it ;)
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I like the latter B&W with room to breath in the sky. It's rewarding to explore photos where the composition has had some more consideration than the usual snaps you see elsewhere.
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I just realized that what bothers me most about the revised B&W is that it isn't sharp, unlike the original, which is tack sharp. The cropping is better, but the grasses in front are really fuzzy, as if it had been up-rezzed from a too small image. Does it really look sharp to others?
I do like the increased space at the top.
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Not just you Eric, the second one is really unsharp.
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The same thing happened as with the first posting of the color version... a very small file size got uprezzed.
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just realized that what bothers me most about the revised B&W is that it isn't sharp, unlike the original, which is tack sharp. The cropping is better, but the grasses in front are really fuzzy, as if it had been up-rezzed from a too small image. Does it really look sharp to others?
Eric, for some reason. I'm having trouble with my Lightroom Export settings since I posted the first picture. I thank that explains the fuzziness, but I'm happy now with the composition etc.
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Any better?
Excellent. Not a cliche at all IMHO. To me its a very good picture....