River shot C&C

I shot this on a river in central washington last weekend. Any comments and critique are welome. And in particular any suggestions on what to do about the blown out sky (if anything). Thanks in advance.
cmh

Beautiful shot! You can alter the sky on PP might add to the overall feel,

I know I haven't waited for many responses, but I think I like this better than the first post. Thoughts?

Thanks,
cmh

First off, nice image. Maybe it is just me but the WB seems a bit off. Veiwing on a calibrated monitor the rocks have a lot of yellow in them. Are they actually that way?

Must'v been an overcast day. You might try pumping up the contrast/saturation a bit on the non-sky area. Your edit is better in the sky but you might think about pasting in some cloud cover from another shot.

Sky looks better in second version. I like the way the water looks in the river, as well. I am just not a fan of the overall composition of the shot.

Northwoods Bill wrote in post #15171084
First off, nice image. Maybe it is just me but the WB seems a bit off. Veiwing on a calibrated monitor the rocks have a lot of yellow in them. Are they actually that way?

I did warm it up in post a bit, maybe I went too far. But yes, the rocks there do have some warm colors in them.

Qbx wrote in post #15171268
Must'v been an overcast day. You might try pumping up the contrast/saturation a bit on the non-sky area. Your edit is better in the sky but you might think about pasting in some cloud cover from another shot.

Yes, it was an overcast morning. I did try pasting some clouds in, but it didn't look real to me, but maybe that is just in my mind. Also, I didn't want to add anything to make the scene any busier. I liked the vignette in the corner better. I will try increasing the contrast and saturation more. I did bump it a little, but didn't want to overdo it.

Thanks everyone for the comments, I really appreciate it.
Chris

Other than agreeing with some of the other comments here related to the contrast and saturation, it appears that the golden trees are a bit OOF? Also, I'm not too keen on the crop/composition. I would include more into the scene on the right as the river flows.

I'd suggest fixing the slanted horizon ... rivers don't run up

barkingspud wrote in post #15172073
Other than agreeing with some of the other comments here related to the contrast and saturation, it appears that the golden trees are a bit OOF? Also, I'm not too keen on the crop/composition. I would include more into the scene on the right as the river flows.

I did notice that myself, and tried to sharpen them as best I could. I'm not sure if I had the lens open too wide, or if it was wind. Looking for exif info in flickr, and I think it is stripped out, so I'll have to post it from home tonight. I think it was shot at f16, but I'm not sure.

Regarding the composition, I have some shots that include more to the right, but the sky quickly becomes a much larger component of the photo, which I didn't like.

Thanks very much for the comments.
cmh

The sky is overexposed and the rest seems a bit underexposed.

To fix the sky, you need to do one of two things. Either take another exposure and expose for the sky and then blend your shots together in Photoshop or use a filter kit with graduated ND filters and place the filter in position over the sky to darken it.

There isn't anything you can do to fix the sky now, it's gone.

Thanks everyone for the comments. And for the edit Bianchi - looks better than mine.

cmh

I like the original post. You may have posted it that way because that is how you remember the scene- YOU were there. The brightness of the trees is mimicked in the foreground leaves and just a touch in the treetops of the pines near the sky. Doing something with the white/gray of the sky? Yeah, if you can. But a very good photo.