Out for a drive in the hills II

Here's a couple more from my last outing. I can't wait to get back up to this area. It is just beautiful from there. Comments and suggestions encouraged please.

I encourage you to do more! Where is this? I am down here in Galveston area. There's no place like that around here!

Lonnie Mac wrote in post #13409761
I encourage you to do more! Where is this? I am down here in Galveston area. There's no place like that around here!

My profile pic also shows that I've been in Montana for 12 years. I sure do miss the ocean, southern talk, cicadas and the peepers at night. How is Galveston doing since the hurricane? Post some pics if you can. These were taken near East Helena, Montana. Beautiful country around here but we pay for it with frequent droughts and temps down to 30 below zero.

Great pics. I would probably crop the first one from the top a bit, to just below the two wisps on the left side. The clouds in the top left don't add any drama IMO, it's the clouds on the right that are doing that. I know, people say break it into thirds but rules are made to be broken and I think it would look even better than it already does.

I'm intrigued with the big hay bale. The sharpness of it lets me find the patters in the bale interesting. Because it's a bit darker than the foreground and the shafts of light in the center, there's some competition for the focus of the picture.

Normally, I don't think I'd find a hay bale interesting, but you've done it for me. Is there a crop or some lighting adjustments that could place more emphasis on the bale?

Both are awesome shots, though I'm a bit more biased towards the first one. I love the hay bales and the sunlight creeping through the clouds.

elrey2375 wrote in post #13410160
Great pics. I would probably crop the first one from the top a bit, to just below the two wisps on the left side. The clouds in the top left don't add any drama IMO, it's the clouds on the right that are doing that. I know, people say break it into thirds but rules are made to be broken and I think it would look even better than it already does.

Thanks. I'll have to give that a try and see how it turns out.

cpam.pix wrote in post #13410946
I'm intrigued with the big hay bale. The sharpness of it lets me find the patters in the bale interesting. Because it's a bit darker than the foreground and the shafts of light in the center, there's some competition for the focus of the picture.

Normally, I don't think I'd find a hay bale interesting, but you've done it for me. Is there a crop or some lighting adjustments that could place more emphasis on the bale?

I'll have to try to figure out a way to lighten the hay bale up a bit. Good to know that you find my hay bale interesting. I think the angle makes this shot look better than straight on.

xcel730 wrote in post #13411526
Both are awesome shots, though I'm a bit more biased towards the first one. I love the hay bales and the sunlight creeping through the clouds.

Thanks so much. I also like the first one better. The composition and foreground interest gives it more depth.

W O W !! #1 is a classic shot. Blow it up, frame it and hang it. It's a winner!

How about something like this;

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/69976835@N07/6​358119489/

I posted this to show the similarity. Your pic is much better than mine but I think we had the same idea. The sky is nowhere near what yours shows. Very nice and I like your pic.

I haven't played around with cropping the foreground to bring the hay bale closer.The horizon needs straightening as well. It looked different actually being there but the general idea was to direct the eye between the hay bales to the hydro tower in the distance. The angle of the hay bale in your pic and mine is somewhat the same.

This was taken with an SD1200

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I hope you don't mind my posting these. I see it as a learning experience for me.

Here is the pic straightened and cropped.

I should also add that this is facing north east at about the 2:00 o'clock position. That is not the direction to be facing in Manitoba for pics backlit by the sun.

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Hi Norm

Very nice pictures also, don't forget you can use the digital dark room to bring out what you saw, and the picture in the camera is a base. To get a good photo, not degraded in the camera, calm neutral colours are often used and it's a good idea to set sharpening to low to have the least artifacts possible on your base photo if you're shooting jpeg, and then when done you can add the contrast, saturation and play with the lighting until it's what you saw. A film photographer didn't stop with snapping the picture, they used the dark room the bring it out how they wanted, today with an array computer programs to tweak your photos, take your favorites and play with them. Just be sure to copy them into .tiff or .psp (photo shop) or a similar non degrading file type before you play so you don't degrade you photo by resaving a jpeg. It is also a good idea to save the original untouched.

Something like this, but with your vision and the large original, hard to do with a little one. I didn't add any saturation, maybe the blue could be more saturated to give a darker sky, etc. I just upped the contrast to show definition in the clouds against the sky and cropped the lovely sky at 2/3's of the photo, bringing the hay bale out front, other little tweaks could be done.

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Norman B wrote in post #13417784
I hope you don't mind my posting these. I see it as a learning experience for me.

Here is the pic straightened and cropped.

I should also add that this is facing north east at about the 2:00 o'clock position. That is not the direction to be facing in Manitoba for pics backlit by the sun.

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@Simplyphotos, OP and others,

Thanks and really appreciate the imput. Again, I want to stress it is not my intention to hijack the OP's thread. I think his photo with the hay bales and my photo compliment each other.

Your crop job/tweaking looks fanctastic and is more in line with the vision I had. The hay bales take the eye to the horizon, the hydro towers take the eye back further and the clouds take the eye into infinity.

1- The darkroom you speak of. Is that a program on its own or a section within a program such as photshop.

I don't have any editing programs at the present time other than a simple program that came with the printer and Microsoft Works.

Generally, I keep the original pic on the memory chip but have saved a copy of the odd original as a .jpg. I won't do that anymore. I keep all pics on the the memory chip and have put the better ones on a flash stick The other thing I don't do anymore is have the "date imprint" on. I can add that text on which would appear in the flashstick but not the one on the chip.

I keep photos on the computer for awhile and have the chip and flashstick as back up. I simply get a new chip when a chip has 4 - 500 pics on it. A 4 GB class 10 memory chip is selling for around $16.00 in Wpg which is cheap when you consider how many 36 exposure rolls of film would be required to have the same amount of pics. That doesn't include developing costs.

I will keep your suggestions to refer to and start researching to find out what you suggested. Thanks again.

NeutronBoy wrote in post #13416288
W O W !! #1 is a classic shot. Blow it up, frame it and hang it. It's a winner!

Thanks so much! That's a wonderful compliment and it's good to know that I am making progress.

Winco wrote in post #13416942
How about something like this;

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …/69976835@N07/6​358119489/
6351131271_03a743cbfe_​b-2 by Winco1, on Flickr

Thanks for taking the time to edit my photo but it's a little too bright for my taste. This was taken near sunset and I want it to represent what I saw.

Norman B wrote in post #13417708
I posted this to show the similarity. Your pic is much better than mine but I think we had the same idea. The sky is nowhere near what yours shows. Very nice and I like your pic.

I haven't played around with cropping the foreground to bring the hay bale closer.The horizon needs straightening as well. It looked different actually being there but the general idea was to direct the eye between the hay bales to the hydro tower in the distance. The angle of the hay bale in your pic and mine is somewhat the same.

This was taken with an SD1200

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Thanks for posting your photos. I think you did a good job leading the eye into your photo. The only real differences between our photos are the green grass and no mountains in your version. The grass is only green here for maybe a month out of the year. The rest of the time it is brown, gold or yellow.

Norman B wrote in post #13417784
I hope you don't mind my posting these. I see it as a learning experience for me.

Here is the pic straightened and cropped.

I should also add that this is facing north east at about the 2:00 o'clock position. That is not the direction to be facing in Manitoba for pics backlit by the sun.

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I don't mind at all. I am still learning myself so any input will also benefit me.

So mad at myself. I was coming back from New Braunfels a few weeks ago and saw a scene JUST like this (sans mountains of course!), had my cam with me too... I was too lazy to stop!