Learning Landscape

[Mal Firth]

I'm anxious to improve my landscape photography and hope you will give me some honest critiques of what I've done so far. I bought my Minolta D7i about 18 months ago but it is only since I took up country walking about 6 months ago that I have started to regularly take landscape pictures. The one here was taken last weekend whilst out walking in the Peak District National Park of the UK and is one of only about a dozen landscape pictures I have taken so far that I would consider fit to show other people. You can find some of my others (plus some cycle racing pictures) at www.msf-online.co.uk

[rondon]

Reminds me of this other photo
RonDon

[Leah]

I like the photo and the composition.

Two small points (and I'm being Ms Picky here since this is the Critiques section):

Firstly the horizon looks a bit slanted - higher on the left than on the right in both the near silhouetted section and the far horizon. This could just be the way it was, but also the figures seem to be leaning to the right slightly which makes me suspect camera tilt. If you rotate about 0.7 - 0.75 degrees anticlockwise and then recrop back to your panoramic format then that effect's less disturbing.

Secondly, there's not much contrast in the sky. You could maybe experiment with boosting just that area with curves, and possibly crop a little bit more off the top (not too much though as that spoils the composition).

[jch71566]

OK, let me start by saying that I am being very picky here.

There are a few things that bother me about this:
1) The foreground and figures seem unaturally dark. They have obviously been digitally altered.
2) The scene seems to lack a certain "Oomph" that makes a good landscape. I think that perhaps the haze is the factor. It causes the detail to be lost on the distant points, and makes the sky a big mass of even color.
3) The picture has been overly jpeg compressed. I tried to manipulate it to add back some "oomph" and got bricks for the sky
4) The unlevel horizon is distracting

I think that the colors are pleasing, and the composition is also done well.

Best of luck!
-Jeff

[sdubose99]

Hi Mal, best of luck with your Minolta. Your picture is "sort of" interesting, only for the silouetted people in front of the vast landscape. I would have enjoyed seeing more variety in the background, something notable. But I understand you get what you can get, right? I agree with the other comments people have made, especially the horizon and lack of contrast. You can correct those easily in your image editor.

BTW, here is one of my favorite galleries of landscape pictures taken with the Dimage 7... http://www.pbase.com/zylen/landscapes

Scott

[Duv]

Hi Mal

I like your picture and agree with the comments so far. I like the panorama layout and the colours in the landscape are very nice. The large expanse of shadow certainly halts the viewer and begs the question, what is causing it. It may or may not be appropriate to include what is causing the shadow to put things in context. The image would be stronger if there was some show of affection between adult and child. I'm not sure if this shot is right out of the camera but if you have image editing software, use it to really make your images pop. The only other thing is try taking some of your walks at dawn or dusk. You can get some wonderful coloring. By the way, I checked your website and found several images that evoke a wonderful mood.

Good Luck
Duv

[jch71566]

Originally Posted by jch71566

OK, let me start by saying that I am being very picky here.

There are a few things that bother me about this:
1) The foreground and figures seem unaturally dark. They have obviously been digitally altered.
2) The scene seems to lack a certain "Oomph" that makes a good landscape. I think that perhaps the haze is the factor. It causes the detail to be lost on the distant points, and makes the sky a big mass of even color.
3) The picture has been overly jpeg compressed. I tried to manipulate it to add back some "oomph" and got bricks for the sky
4) The unlevel horizon is distracting

I think that the colors are pleasing, and the composition is also done well.

Best of luck!
-Jeff

Sometimes, I get wrapped up and forget where I'm coming from. Here are a few pointers:
* Try using a polarizing filter. This will cut some haze, and provide more interesting skies.
* Watch the direction, quality, and color of light. The picture appears to have been taken within a few hours of noon (the shadows from the clouds, and lack of shadows from hills gives it away). Many professional photographers scorn the noon and afternoon sun as being "too harsh". Landscapes are usually best when shot within an hour or two of sunrise or sunset (this is often called the "golden hour").
* It is the light direction that makes the foreground characters look artificially shadowed. If you have reasons not to include them in the photo then recompose and do not include them.

Best of luck!

-Jeff