Pescadero Sunset

Gallery: LandscapePosted November 22, 201090 views5 comments

This picture was taken at Pescadero Beach. I used a levels adjustment to brighten the dark water a bit, and a curves adjustment to intensify the colors in the sky, and increased the saturation a little bit. I was unable to fix the blown out sun.

I would like to know what you think of the photo and did I over saturate the photo?

Thank you very much.

Comments

5 comments

Comment posted by Tony Kuyper on November 22, 2010 at 10:04 PM

It all looks fine, Zaynab. I like the comp with the off-center sun.

Registered on November 1, 2003, 364 Posts, 22328 Comments

Comment posted by David Chauvin on November 23, 2010 at 6:20 AM

Very nice, Zaynab. The colors and lighting look very natural and the composition is pleasing.

Registered on August 5, 2004, 1007 Posts, 5595 Comments

Comment posted by Chris Chamberlain on November 23, 2010 at 9:31 PM

Very nice, Zaynab! This looks old school to me, and I can definatley see your father's infuence.

Chris

Registered on March 13, 2007, 500 Posts, 8365 Comments

Comment posted by Youssef Ismail on November 23, 2010 at 10:23 PM

Chris,

I like that comment...Old School.

In fact it does harken back to the days before even GND filters when you had no choice but to have very dark foregrounds when the sky and sun were included.

But for a youngster like my daughter, seeing her move up the photographic ladder in sophistication is very exciting.

What is neat about your photo Zaynab is that you let your heart dictate what to photograph. It might not be perfect in every aspect from a modern technical photo point of view, but that this scene moved you enough to point the camera at it and make this photo. I think it came out wonderful and it looks and feels just as it was that afternoon.

Registered on November 1, 2003, 474 Posts, 5555 Comments

Comment posted by Lon Overacker on November 24, 2010 at 2:14 AM

Well said Youssef!

Zaynab, first to answer your question, the colors do not look oversaturated to my eye at all. In fact the colors look quite natural.

As you may have already discovered or been shown, this is a classic situation for one of two techniques. Either A. a graduated neutral density filter to basically give you a couple of more stops of light between the dark and light parts of the image. or B. the use of multiple exposures and blending them in PS. It would be nice to see a bit more detail in the rocks and surfs.

Having said that, the proportion of sky to sea/rocks tells me you were really interested in the sky and sunset and so the fact that the surf went a little dark is not that big of a deal, really.

thanks for sharing - keep it up.

Lon

Registered on November 24, 2006, 521 Posts, 19147 Comments