South Mineral Creek, Colorado

We took a little Colorado vacation, unfortunately we had rain much of the time so we were trying to keep the cameras dry. Worth anything as a picture, needs a lot of help, or just a nice snapshot for the memories ?

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/okxZ​zz

I think it deserves more than just a place in your trip scrapbook to provide a tickle for your memories.

If you want to turn it into a 'work of art', you could probably tweek it a bit. I assume you are shooting in raw so you have more flexibility in making the photo more impactful. The composition is what makes the shot worth working on as it is the classic clockwise swirl. The tasks (in my subjective opinion) would be to darken the foreground slope on the right to keep the viewers eye from being attracted there; lighten and brighten the green in the valley a tad; lighten the orange rock formation and make it more saturated/contrasty; and use something like NIK Efex Pro to bring out just the clouds and make them more ominous.

When finished, the viewer would first be drawn to the center green foreground slope which you left lighter, then follow the road up the valley. Once at the end of the valley the viewer would scan the clouds and end up at the darker mountain on the right. Once there the eye would follow the slope down to the rock formation, and lastly give the overall image a final scan.

The result might not fetch many buyers on the open market, but could be considered for hanging on one of your walls.

Did you make it up to the ice lakes basin at all?

Jon - thanks for taking a look and commenting. I'll see if I can do some of what you suggested, I'm still figuring out how to do things.

I really doubt I will ever take photos that anyone would buy. I'd just like them to at least be good enough that other people can enjoy them, not just me or my family / friends.

TheInfamousGreedo wrote in post #17123304
Did you make it up to the ice lakes basin at all?

We drove up to Clear Lake, didn't stay long as it was very windy and starting to rain again. The Ice Lakes basin is reached via a hiking trail that starts off from that road, right ?

This is one of the moods of the place and you show it for what it is and how you felt it.
+1 for Jon's ideas.

I font see a creek in this image.

dixiedawn wrote in post #17123833
We drove up to Clear Lake, didn't stay long as it was very windy and starting to rain again. The Ice Lakes basin is reached via a hiking trail that starts off from that road, right ?

The trailhead starts at the campground before you turn and head up to Clear Lake.

I still haven't been up to any of those lakes; when I was in the area it was May and everything was still buried under a few feet of snow.

tmcman wrote in post #17127191
This is one of the moods of the place and you show it for what it is and how you felt it.
+1 for Jon's ideas.

Thank you.

HappySnapper90 wrote in post #17128511
I font see a creek in this image.

oops. The creek is actually South Fork of Mineral Creek. It's down in the valley bottom to the left of the road. I can't find the name of the valley on any of my maps - in CO it seems many of them are something Gulch. I title my photos with location names, so my family and friends will know where they are.

TheInfamousGreedo wrote in post #17128596
The trailhead starts at the campground before you turn and head up to Clear Lake.

I still haven't been up to any of those lakes; when I was in the area it was May and everything was still buried under a few feet of snow.

There is a very popular trailhead in one of the first switchbacks on the way to Clear Lake, it was packed with cars. I thought that might be the Ice Lakes trail.