The Waiting

Michael, IMO the sky looks a little to bright for a nighttime image, if it wasn't for the stars I would have thought this was taken in late afternoon. I suggest darkening the sky a bit and maybe increasing the contrast a little on the mountains. With a little tweaking you'll have a fine image to display!

Very interesting and well captured desert scene, Michael. One could spend a LOT of time counting the saguaro cactus throughout the frame here. Probably the most I've ever seen in one image that's for sure.

Love your title! Great comp. I agree with Zack on the sky.

Beautiful desertscape here Michael. There is a lot going on and MANY subjects to look at (almost like a where's waldo of saguaro), but I think the elements are all arranged in a pleasing way, love the larger cacti on the left to anchor, and the subtle light is terrific. I also think this presents much better in a larger format. I agree w/ the others and would try to darken the sky and some of the shadows to make this feel a little more night-like and this would hopefully help make the stars pop a bit more. Good luck on your show!

Thanks everybody. Here is a repost with a darkened sky. Please let me know what you think!

Repost looks much improved, could even go a bit darker on the sky to bring out the stars even more. Adding a small halo effect on the stars using a layer in PS might help. You can do this by duplicating the layer and setting the blend mode to lighten then adding a gaussian blur of about 5.5, and then restrict this effect to the sky using layer masks.

If you want to see an example of what this looks like see my post HERE and scroll down to the second image I posted (the one with the landscape), here I've added this halo effect to make the stars more pronounced. Hope this helps.

I love the multitude of cactii, but agree with Zack that the sky is far too light to portray a night shot. I've only seen saguaro one time, while driving through Arizona. I would love to visit this location and wander through this beautiful country.

I like this scene a lot. The ambient light is reflecting off the cactus quite nicely, and the color palette is pleasing. I prefer the original you posted.

This is a very cool image, Michael. I really like all the cactus and the light on them and the mountains is very nice. I like it much better with the darker sky too. This should be great in your show. I'm sure it will be a hit!

Nick Bristol
Lone Rock, WI

I really like the forest-ness of this and the light in the 2nd version is even better.

A fine composition, and you have shown that the Saguaro "forest" is amazing. Lovely light.

I prefer the repost but it seems it went a touch flat. Maybe a bit of midtone contrast? I like how the saguaro stand out and the density of them shown.