Manzano Mountains

I've been playing serious catch-up with processing recently, but am at last making some headway. This one is from mid-October in New Mexico's Manzano Range, south of Albuquerque. The Manzanos are known for their maple groves in the fall, but I was a little late for those, and had to content myself with orange scrub oaks and evening light.

1/125, f8, 12mm, ISO 200.

I really like the comp here, and it's a very interesting set of peaks. I think I'd opt for lightening the mountains some, to make them pop a bit more, but that's it. I like the distant lowlands included, that really adds depth.

I like the comp too Jackson, but agree with Todd that the mountains seem a bit dark (though the sky seems just right which doesn't make much sense unless a grad was used or the light was obscured by clouds).

Nice work. Lines make an interesting comp. Given the chance, I would consider darkening the foreground rocks a bit.

Bill Brennan

This is a fine composition, and agree with Bill re: burning down the rocks toward the middle.

I like the comp. Great light and color as well.

I agree with the other folks: great comp; dodge-n-burn. Thanks for sharing!

I like the composition also. A combination of curves and layers as well as side light shadows make it unique and interesting. This composition would have been a good HDR candidate IMO. Would have allowed you to reduce the hard side shadow while still maintaining the warmness without loosing what is in between.

Fabulous comp! I think some of the previously mentioned comments are good ones. Maybe flatten the constrast a bit with a double processed raw file.

Thanks everyone, always helpful! I spent some time dodging and burning this morning, and I think the result is definitely an improvement. Check it out here if you like. Mel, I believe there was indeed some shading from clouds on the further peaks; I didn't use a GND in the field, nor a digital version. Paul, I might go ahead and try the double processed RAW idea at some point, it'd be interesting to see what results.

Hmmm...after considerable comparisons, I'm just not seeing any difference between the two.
Perhaps a double processed file will do the trick. Unless you edit the title to say "+Repost" or some such, not many will return to see your editied version.