Posted by Kurt Rinne on October 14, 2009 at 11:58 PM
Finally getting around to processing some of my photos of the whirlwind tour that started in Aspen/Maroon Bells going over Mclure pass down over Kebler pass into Crested butte. Then making are way back over to Delta and down to Ridgeway. I have to thank my good friend Kalin Wilson for giving me my first taste of Sw Colorado. And what a great taste it was. I can't thank him enough for showing me some great areas. I have lots to still go through but I came across this one that I'm very fond of. Hope you all are as well.
C&C are always appreciated
Kurt
Posted by Todd Caudle on October 15, 2009 at 11:48 AM
Geez, nobody's showing Kurt the love? C'mon people!
I like the shot, although it doesn't blow my head off. It defines a Colorado aspen forest well. I think I'd back off the hdr a little bit and let the darks go darker, but this is still nice.
Posted by Jim Casteel on October 15, 2009 at 12:43 PM
The HDR on the ground is really strong, it creates unnecessary busyness. If it were toned down a bit I think it would make a much stronger image.
Posted by Craig Schultz on October 15, 2009 at 2:00 PM
Hmm, HDR? I don't think so, but I could be wrong. In fact, my first impression was that the whole image was too dark. Must be my work monitor.
If it was brightened a bit I think I might be more inclined to give it a thumbs up, but the busy forest floor with all the fallen trunks isn't doing it for me either.
Posted by Jesse Speer on October 15, 2009 at 2:19 PM
It does look like you opened up the shadows somehow, HDR or whatever. It doesn't bother me in any one area, but the top half doesn't seem to jive with the bottom half (lighting isn't even). If it were mine ... I'd even out the bole lighting, crop some off the top/bottom and generally ensure that the focus is on the yellow above and below - the part that grabs me most in this shot. Sorry to play the "here's what I'd do" card, but it sometimes it can help ... if your asking for critique.
Posted by Kurt Rinne on October 15, 2009 at 3:06 PM
Thanks all for the great feedback,
I will try and redo this later tonight. This actually is a blend of 2 raw photos using the exposure blending option in photomatix. I then brought it into lightroom2 which i'm still very new to using and bumped the sat a little and added some sharpening. I liked this image better than the HDR option photomatix kicked out. I did get a warning from photmatix stating it would work better using a tiff or jpg file versus the raw files I used. So I will try that first and see what it does. I did play with the different crops and in the end I leaned towards this ver which has a cropped just a little on the left side due to a dead tree. C&C is always appreciated guys thanks again.
Kurt
Posted by bill meikle on October 15, 2009 at 4:04 PM
Kurt, I like it and I sent you an email with some suggestions.
Posted by Erik Aagaard on October 15, 2009 at 7:15 PM
I actually feel the strongest part of the image is the bottom 3/4s. I am a sucker for graphical elements, and it doesn't get much more graphical than a bunch of vertical aspen trunks. Speaking of vertical, the only thing that bothers me is that it appears you pointed the lens a little above horizontal, resulting in the "falling building" effect. All the trunks appear to be leaning inwards. Photoshop CS4 has a cool feature that lets you correct this, at the expense of cropping part of the image.
Discussion
7 repliesC&C are always appreciated
Kurt
I like the shot, although it doesn't blow my head off. It defines a Colorado aspen forest well. I think I'd back off the hdr a little bit and let the darks go darker, but this is still nice.
If it was brightened a bit I think I might be more inclined to give it a thumbs up, but the busy forest floor with all the fallen trunks isn't doing it for me either.
I will try and redo this later tonight. This actually is a blend of 2 raw photos using the exposure blending option in photomatix. I then brought it into lightroom2 which i'm still very new to using and bumped the sat a little and added some sharpening. I liked this image better than the HDR option photomatix kicked out. I did get a warning from photmatix stating it would work better using a tiff or jpg file versus the raw files I used. So I will try that first and see what it does. I did play with the different crops and in the end I leaned towards this ver which has a cropped just a little on the left side due to a dead tree. C&C is always appreciated guys thanks again.
Kurt