1st attempts at raw

I am relatively new to the forum and posting pics, Im hoping to get alot of criticism as I know Im not an accomplished photographer but hopefully in time with the right assistance who knows?

Here are my first attempts and my first downfall was stupid...I forgot to check my ISO and it was on 800 so these could have been alot better me thinks.

Cheers
Gav

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Good compisiton on the second shot but I think it needs some PP and sharpening.

Cheers frank appreciate the comments

Agree, second one is a good composition, but it's very, very soft, camera shake, narrow DOF?

I like the second one too, nice composition and colour. Needs sharpening.

Again cheers all, as said I did a mistake on these by having the ISO set at 800 so the shutter speed was something rediculous like 1/1600, not sure if this would be the problem,,, when I seen #2 in the viewfinder I thought it was a cracker until I tranfered onto PC and it looked OK and as you said a little soft, if anyone is interested I do have the RAW file if anyone fancies a crack at an edit?

I'll be the oddball!

I like #1 a lot but it needs a tad of help.

I think the comp in the 2nd shot is great, as other have mentioned it is not very sharp.

Shaun

Here ya go Gav!

This more to your liking?
If not I can play with it more.

Slight crop *Resized to 1024x768* before dump to CS2.
Ran curve on it to brighten and add lil more contrast.
Reduce Noise Basic..Default...Stren​gth 10...Preserve detail 100%...Reduce color nosie 45%...Sharpen details 0.
USM at amount 100%...radius 1.5 pix....Threshold 0.
Add text Arial...ALT-0169(makes copyright symbol)...Cursive Handwritting TTF...then back to Arial for 2006...merge layers and save as.

Like I said I'm fairly new to editing but I've learned a LOT!!

BEFORE

HTTP response: 404 | MIME changed to 'text/html' | Byte size: ZERO

Cheers Jim it looks 100% better, I will look at your step by step and see what I can learn, as I said the Raw was not the best so Im amazed at how a naff pic can become decent, if only I had taken a great RAW!!!

Next step learning to frame a pic, I have heard there are actions available for download for CS2 anyone know of a link?

Here are a few places to comb threw for actions and tutorials Gav

http://atncentral.com/

http://homepage.ntlwor​ld.com/pooternerds/Fra​mer/index.html

http://www.outdooreyes​.com/photosection20.ph​p3

http://photoshop.weblo​gsinc.com/

I like number 1 but I would have darkened the sky and added contrast rather than lighten the foregound, it takes away the drama that the sky potentially has.

Neilyb wrote in post #2091882
I like number 1 but I would have darkened the sky and added contrast rather than lighten the foregound, it takes away the drama that the sky potentially has.

I tried that but due to the high ISO the sky got a lotta artifacts (blocky stuff in the sky)
Had to brighten it a tad to get the sharpness to show.

But hey I'm no expert!

Good point, I missed that.

Woking with the original file could really bolster these results. If not using an image hosting site and saving a photo at 100K is ruining your work.