Landscape - Emerald Basin, Canada

Hey y'all! First photos for your critique; have at it!

Dang those are huge...

Beautiful country well captured. I really like #2 followed by #3. The water coming out of the rock on #3 does look odd though, mostly because of the volume I think.

Colors seem quite good as does exposure in a tough environment.

And yes, they exceed forum guidelines by quite a bit - 1024 max on the long edge.

They all look a bit soft, especially in the background.

Titus213 wrote in post #15094534
Beautiful country well captured. I really like #2 followed by #3. The water coming out of the rock on #3 does look odd though, mostly because of the volume I think.

Colors seem quite good as does exposure in a tough environment.

And yes, they exceed forum guidelines by quite a bit - 1024 max on the long edge.

Thanks, Titus! I embedded them from my Tumblr site instead of attaching them.

Gorgeous images but the focus is soft

I can see soft focus in the background of the first photo and probably overall in the third photo. Am I missing something in the second one?

Yes they are soft but man that's some impressive scenery. Give us you're settings and equipment if you want some more critique.

Nick,

I love what you have shot here, but I do see 'some' stuff that you might be, or might not be aware of.

The first one has fringing, even in the mountains, it appears to be over-saturated to make that happen. (like Levels/Selective Coloring maybe? or the blue was forced somehow?) The shadows in the mountain itself are blue.
The sky seems yellow looking, I'm wondering if you have camera settings to where you have it set to something that makes it do that.
(I am not familiar at all with Nikon, so I can't say what I need to, Canon's would be "Picture Style") heheh
It also has yellowish/green tint to it too.

(Actually, there is fringing on them all, mostly red and blue, but it's less noticeable on the last one)

The second image to me looks like it is too mirrored, I know rules aren't always needed to be followed, but it's just too mirrored from what I can see. I know what you are probably going for, and there may not be anything you can do, especially if this is a full-frame shot, with no room to crop. It's really a nice shot, but for the above, at least for me. If you could, maybe add some sky at the top, that would help, but then again, you may not have the image there to do that with, I don't know.

Did you sharpen these, or are they straight out of the camera?
It looks like you should have enough in each image to sharpen it to where it'd look better.

The blacks on all of the images are solid, if you could back off the black some, that might help. The whites look good to me, you even have a little room to play (The last one only) with I think if you wanted to to brighten it up some. You could actually lighten the entire image if you wanted to try that. The shadows are blue in the last shot also.

Really, your shooting skills are good, and some of this stuff I mentioned may also be because of where your images are stored, (tints, etc.) only you can really say.

I know one thing, you sure had a good time, I bet, that is a beautiful place, I've not been to Canada before. As you know, we don't have that kind of mountains here in Texas. heheh

Randy

Q-Man wrote in post #15095698
Yes they are soft but man that's some impressive scenery. Give us you're settings and equipment if you want some more critique.

Will do, I'll post them up when I get home this evening.

Q-Man wrote in post #15095698
Yes they are soft but man that's some impressive scenery. Give us you're settings and equipment if you want some more critique.

exif appears to be on all images.

Very nice Landscape composition of #1, but cant comment on the others, as they are just to big to fit in monitor without scrolling. Maybe you can downsize them some..

I really like everything about 1 and 2.
3 dosnt do much for me sorry and looks a little shaky

recrisp wrote in post #15095786
Nick,

I love what you have shot here, but I do see 'some' stuff that you might be, or might not be aware of.

The first one has fringing, even in the mountains, it appears to be over-saturated to make that happen. (like Levels/Selective Coloring maybe? or the blue was forced somehow?) The shadows in the mountain itself are blue.
The sky seems yellow looking, I'm wondering if you have camera settings to where you have it set to something that makes it do that.
(I am not familiar at all with Nikon, so I can't say what I need to, Canon's would be "Picture Style") heheh
It also has yellowish/green tint to it too.

(Actually, there is fringing on them all, mostly red and blue, but it's less noticeable on the last one)

The second image to me looks like it is too mirrored, I know rules aren't always needed to be followed, but it's just too mirrored from what I can see. I know what you are probably going for, and there may not be anything you can do, especially if this is a full-frame shot, with no room to crop. It's really a nice shot, but for the above, at least for me. If you could, maybe add some sky at the top, that would help, but then again, you may not have the image there to do that with, I don't know.

Did you sharpen these, or are they straight out of the camera?
It looks like you should have enough in each image to sharpen it to where it'd look better.

The blacks on all of the images are solid, if you could back off the black some, that might help. The whites look good to me, you even have a little room to play (The last one only) with I think if you wanted to to brighten it up some. You could actually lighten the entire image if you wanted to try that. The shadows are blue in the last shot also.

Really, your shooting skills are good, and some of this stuff I mentioned may also be because of where your images are stored, (tints, etc.) only you can really say.

I know one thing, you sure had a good time, I bet, that is a beautiful place, I've not been to Canada before. As you know, we don't have that kind of mountains here in Texas. heheh

Randy

Randy, thanks for the great insight!

The blue you're talking about in the first shot, I think, is where the far trees and mountains meet, right? I have noticed that and I didn't feel like there was much I could do to change it without doing something dramatic in Photoshop. It is leaps and bounds better than the original photo, though. I might benefit from using some kind of filter, I don't have any in my kit. Also, I'll do some Googling to see if there's anything inside the camera that would help me when shooting landscapes in the future.

The second image is actually composed of three images (crop sensor is no friend to me). When I shot it at 28mm on film, it fit perfectly within a vertical frame. The reflection it is what it is; the lake was choppy when I hiked up the trail but glassed off for the evening so I was insanely stoked that I'd get to try some reflection shots. I definitely agree this shot could use more headroom but I don't have any more photo to add to the frame, unfortunately.

I sharpened them just a bit using the Punch function in LR4, didn't tack on any extra sharpness.

I think I will toy with the third shot a bit; I do see what you're talking about with the blue shadows and I have to agree it'd look better with black. As for other responders re: camera shake, it's likely attributed to using a 300mm with a shutter speed that wasn't fast enough; next time I'll bring the tripod on my hike or maybe play with exposure compensation. It was probably shot at 5.6 or 8; the min aperture on that lens is 4.5 and it generally looks like crap wide open.

A good time was definitely had, my friend! It was an amazing hike with an amazing reward. I was so freaking stoked when I made it to the end of the trail that I hollered at the top of my lungs. The hike seemed so long and arduous, especially going solo; I thought about turning back so many times it was ridiculous. Even met one couple that was turning around as they were just about 5 minutes from reaching the basin (little did they know).

And I was wondering how long I'd get away with being a Nikonian in a Canon group! Guess not very long!

Thanks for all the compliments and comments, y'all! Much appreciated.