Muted

[Richard Pearlman]

Comments and critiques are appreciated.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

I am tempted to suggest to crop the horizon out, as the eye quickly skips the muted foreground and rushes to the strongest highlight in the picture, upper right.

[Richard Pearlman]

I tried cropping it, but something feels wrong when I do.

[Walt Roycraft]

Agree with Slobodon, crop out the horizon and you have a much stronger image.

[Richard Pearlman]

Thanks, Walt and Slobodan. Here is the cropped version.

[Paulo Bizarro]

I prefer the original version, the cropped one just ends up being too drab/dull?

[luxborealis]

Why?

The discussion about whether or not to keep or crop the horizon has everything to do with why you photographed the scene in the first place. What was your goal? What were you trying to communicate?

Keeping the bright horizon accentuates the muted foreground. Yes, one's eye rushes to the brightest point, Slobodan, but then it "relaxes" and starts to wander through the rest of the photo.

Perhaps the "weakness" (if it can be called that) is that there isn't much in the rest of the photo to appreciate other than the replication of shape, tone and colour. But, if that's what you were after, Richard, then you've succeeded!

[stamper]

I think there is a difference between muted and underexposed. Imo this is just underexposed.