Revealed

[maddogmurph]

I've spent entirely too much time considering this photo... Had to do a little minor cloning on the bottom for a focus stacking issue. The shot had to be handheld, so it's a bit softer than I'd like, but given the low light the d850 saved my ass here. I'm still trying to decide whether I should go 5:4 here, and crop the top/bottom out. Also the color theory is really challenging. How much light/saturation is needed is incredibly hard given the really bright/colorful foreground, and somewhat lackluster sky.

Thoughts?

[maddogmurph]

Lacks a subject or context.

  - All I ask for is honesty Guido. If that's the way you feel, I welcome the feedback. I have a feeling you're just duping my honest comment on your image because you didn't like my feedback.

The reason I'm honest here is that I wish people had been more honest with me here when I first started posting years ago. I think if people had challenged my thoughts on what creates a good photograph earlier, I might have taken a different look at the way I capture, and portray or even look at a scene. Slobodan ripped me a few times, which I'm grateful for. Obviously didn't really like it at the time, but looking back, he was right.

If you don't want my feedback on your photographs I won't leave them.

Regards,

Maddog Murph

[maddogmurph]

yes please refrain.

Done, but the comment was clear. Ask yourself, what is the subject? What's happening in fore, mid, and infinity? How does this create context or form the setting for a statement?

But don't worry I won't be wasting my time in the future with "mud slinging" on your photographs - or what I would call constructive feedback you don't want to hear.

[David Eckels]

I see your dilema. I find my eye going to that thingy in the tree, but cropping just down below that I think the distant peak stands out more. The blur in the branches  would also be minimized with a crop. And that saturation, WOW, I see you've got your hands full! Tony Kuyper has a nice couple of tutorials on saturation and vibrance masking; maybe that would help with the balancing.

Other than that, A LOVELY IMAGE! Patagonia I assume again.

[Rajan Parrikar]

It is a beautiful image. The saturation of the foliage in the foreground gives it a cooked look but other than that, no quibbles.

[Chris Calohan]

I like the composition and I really want to do Patagonia but for me, the color seems over-saturated. The bottom is okay by me but as Dave pointed out, it does seem a bit too hot.

[Jeremy Roussak]

I like it, although I agree that it does seem over-saturated. It might have been nice to have moved a bit to your right, so the branches didn't interfere with the left-and peaks, but I suspect that would have involved falling down a slope.

Jeremy

[Peter McLennan]

I like the branches overlapping the mountain peak.. Gives it some depth.

Saturation is a matter of taste I believe. In this case I like it. Perhaps a little less in the fg as Rajan suggests.

 In any case it is a spectacular image

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

First, let me state that I like the image. Sometimes, the nature and the moment are so spectacular, that you almost can’t make a bad image out of it. I think you did very well compositionally, with the choice of the foreground and background. The complexity of details and saturation remind me of Asian drawings or paintings. I think that one of our forum friends, shadowblade, argued at some point that the Asian market prefers saturated images. Whether it is over or just right, is a matter of taste, of course, but I do not find your rendering objectionable.

Now, nitpicks. The blob. Softer branches at the very top (as much as I can judge on my iPad). Since I was using iPad, it by default cropped the image to its native ratio (4:3) and it allowed me to easily test what to crop, if any.

So, my suggestions: crop the top. It eliminated the softer branches, and makes the blob much less prominent and much more balanced in the final composition. As for the lower part, I would experiment with dimming it slightly, which would automatically reduce, again slightly, the saturation, and lead the eye toward the mountains.

Pardon me for butchering your image, but just to illustrate the iPad crop suggestion, this is screenshot of it:

[farbschlurf]

Slobobans crop makes the picture more balanced, I agree. The color is extreme to my eye, strangely in this case it somehow stops me to look "within" the image. I am blocked by the color "on top" and stop there, so to say. In other words, the color is much more prominent than the actual scene. Which is okay of course (and has a strong impact here), if that's what you wanted to do. Still I wonder how a less colored photo would look like. I don't say anything about whether that is "realistic" or not, as I don't know.

[maddogmurph]

Thanks for the feedback!

[David Eckels]

I think that pretty closely nails it. To my eye, the thingy at the top is now somewhat less distracting. Beautiful image.

[maddogmurph]

It might have been nice to have moved a bit to your right, so the branches didn't interfere with the left-and peaks, but I suspect that would have involved falling down a slope.

Not so far off, I'll probably have a drone instead of a brick that needs a tripod... For now, yes, impossible. This was nearly impossible, I had to hand hold which is not ideal in low light. 4/5 were blurry. I was lucky to get this shot.