More Coalmine Canyon

[David Eckels]

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[Eric Myrvaagnes]

Well seen, David.

(Better crunchy than soupie, IMHO.    )

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

... (Better crunchy than soupie, IMHO.    )

Sorry, I belatedly realized this isn't the critique forum. Deleted.

[David Eckels]

Sorry, I'm a little dense today from last night's whisky and cigars event but I don't mind a critical comment, even here. Crunchy I understand, soupie not. Are you saying you think these are over sharpened, Eric? Too much structure using SEP-3? They do look a little crunchy to me this AM, but then I am not in my right mind! I was going for crunchy in #3, but maybe it spilled over into #2 and #4. I can take it like a man!

[PeterAit]

This is quite a scene you have photographed! What is it, an abandoned coal mine? But let me say that the photos look a a bit over-processed. There's a lack of smoothness between the tones.

[David Eckels]

Peter, I don't know the answer to your question. It is a canyon on Navajo land, probably a hundred square miles or so, 4WD required to get down to it. As for processing, I appreciate the comment. I posted the first one and these followed that processing very closely. As I mentioned, #3 was pushed pretty hard, the others less so. I am going to go back and see if I can match the first one in terms of tonality etc. When my head clears, of course!

[Arlen]

These are all very nice and interesting, David. As for the crunchiness, the last two do seem to have a little excess structure/texture added, but maybe even a little so in the first one. Especially in the distance. With normal vision, things up close look detailed and sharp, but less so as they fade into the distance. Unless that effect of departing from "normal" is actually what you are going for, of course.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

These are all very nice and interesting, David. As for the crunchiness, the last two do seem to have a little excess structure/texture added, but maybe even a little so in the first one. Especially in the distance. With normal vision, things up close look detailed and sharp, but less so as they fade into the distance. Unless that effect of departing from "normal" is actually what you are going for, of course.

Correct.

Sorry, Dave, it was me (if you had any doubts ) that started with the "crunchy" comment. As Arien pointed above, when you decide to go against the "normal" human perception (which in itself could be a legitimate artistic tool), you are losing the 3D impression, the sense of depth, which is rather helpful in separating the foreground, middle-ground, and background.  For instance, Rembrandt was known to have the closer eye sharp in his portraits, while the other one ever so slightly blurred.

[David Eckels]

Arlen, Slobodan, thanks for the comments and no apologies necessary for the critiques. Even though this is not the critique forum!
I understood Arlen's comment and actually noted the same thing in the first one. Looking at it after a few days, I would fade that sky. And Slobodan, I appreciate you are comparing me to Rembrandt, but really, that is a little over the top I never deeply thought of the concept as applied to landscapes, but have noticed that my  most successful landscapes seem to come from shots where I have focused on the foreground and let the distances fade naturally, if that makes sense. I did the same thing here, but I think the processing got away from me. To wit, the comments.
FWIW, I am trying to get these wrestled into matching tonalities with the very first I posted. I have been looking at tools by which to compare tonal distributions, the histogram for example, but there may be better ways to address Peter's concern about the seeming lack of smoothness between tones. These were very high contrast images to start and I recognized the need to moderate. I likely took some wrong turns, but alas, I'm not Rembrandt