Lenticular Majesty

Weird.... Your edit seems to have removed my comment?? Anyway, lenticular clouds are also high on my to-do list, so congrats on finally succeeding! I like the picture a lot, but I would probably darken the flowers a bit, so that they fit better with the mountains and the sky. What do you mean with zoom blending? Making two pictures at different focal lengths and overlaying them?

(Ooops, looks like you were deleting the post when I was commenting, so here it the gist of what I originally said.)

Congrats on finally getting your lenticular clouds, especially with the bonus of the lovely flowers! Looks like you put in a LOT of work on this, and the results are certainly worth it. With all the noise reduction software out there, I would hope that you can make at least something like a 30-inch print from this.

The stars shining in a relatively bright sky give it sort of a fantasy feel. (That's not a criticism, just an observation -- nothing wrong with fantasy, especially when it's this beautiful). I do have a couple of critical comments, however: I think zoom blending can be very effective, but in this case I am getting the feel that it makes the mountain "feel" smaller to me, rather than larger. Maybe it's just my old eye, but I think it's because the flowers look larger than I would expect in relation to such a larger mountain. Second, I think the light painting is a bit strong, sort of pulling me away from the fantasy mood of the rest of the scene, and shocking me back into a reality where the lights are shining on the foreground. It's sort of a feeling that I would want to turn off the headlights (or perhaps the back porch light) so I could enjoy the night scene. Of course, nobody looks at a photograph this closely and critically if it's not really worth looking at. Still a lovely scene, and impressive processing!

This is a wonderful view Johan with a very fantasy like feel to it. For me though I have trouble connecting with it. The sky and scene have so much light in them that I shouldn't see stars. The fore ground brightness adds a lot to me not connecting. But don't get me wrong I think the image is very nice but over processed for my tastes.

Very we'll done. I also can see the flowers toned down just a tad.
You were in the right place, these are hard to get, nice work.

I agree with Bill - I find it hard to connect with this, though it is a beautiful scene. The combination of light on the clouds and stars in the sky does not seem right to my eyes - I think it would look more natural if it were darker with less contrast. The lighting on the foreground adds another layer of disconnect; I would try toning down (or removing entirely) the lighting painting effect. I love the lenticular that's being shed, though, very neat!

I love the basic idea and that lenticular cloud is truely magical, Johan. Sounds like a lot of thought and hard work went into creating this fascinating image. For me; and this is just my personal preference; the overall scene is just to bright for the conditions. I think if you darkened this a bit it would be more realistic; at least to me. Just a suggestion of course. If you were going for the fantasy feel as Wayne mentioned I would leave this as is. Congrats on finally getting the lenticular cloud.

Ed

Awesome shot. I too think it would benefit from the luminosity of the foreground being reduced.

I like the fantasy feel to this a lot, some really wonderful phenomena here. I would be interested in what a darker interpretation might look like, and it may help with the noise issues too.

What they said. I love the scene that you captured, but would also like to see a scene with less of a fantasy feel.

Thanks for the feedback! I agree now that the luminosity could be pulled down a bit. I made the mistake of processing the photo right after taking it instead of giving it a week or two, which usually helps to see it more objectively.

I've seen this mountain so many times that I forget to make it the star of the show like it should be.

lovely scene, nice colors

Love the comp, but the contrast and lighting are off. Rework those and this one has real potential.