Walked around for a little while yesterday...

Just killing time, a little CC on the below images?

The bridge was a little crooked so I found it hard to get my lines perfect.

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/jcreed6484/5022​728759/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/jcreed6484/5022​730267/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/jcreed6484/5023​320732/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/jcreed6484/5023​335254/

Beautiful !

Plenty of tonemapping going on

I like the first one - I'm not fan of the water, I think the overdone look doesn't add anything to it.

The fountain - again, I think the overdone look doesn't add to the picture - although it's nice otherwise.

The sunset - I like it, except that the foliage looks bluish (green/blue) and the sky turquoise - else it's quite wonderful with respect to the reds/oranges/yellows.

This level of tonemapping doesn't fit well with the photos

DetlevCM wrote in post #10977412
Plenty of tonemapping going on

I like the first one - I'm not fan of the water, I think the overdone look doesn't add anything to it.

The fountain - again, I think the overdone look doesn't add to the picture - although it's nice otherwise.

The sunset - I like it, except that the foliage looks bluish (green/blue) and the sky turquoise - else it's quite wonderful with respect to the reds/oranges/yellows.

Yea, as I said in your thread, I like that style. The sky in the sunset shot is actually pretty close to what it looked like at the time. We had thunderstorms all day right up until dusk...which is why I think the blues look a little off. I did the best I could with the tree line. I am having a hard time capturing scenes like that without a GND filter (although I'm probably just not doing something right as I have not tried very many so far).

Thanks for the comments

Not a fan of the aggressive tonemapping...pretty much takes them out of the realm of 'photography' and puts it more in the realm of 'digital art'. The fountain scene has excessive halo-ing around the clouds and trees, not to mention the black clouds (also a result of the tonemapping). Personally, I think the composition of the stream is the best of those posted and would have been a winner if left natural (no tonemapping)...the tonemapping seems to have taken away any 'pop' and left it a bit flat. As far as the sunset images goes, if you don't have a GND filter, try two exposures (one for sky, one for foreground) and blend them afterwards. There's nothing inherently 'wrong' with HDR, if its used properly to reflect what the eyes have actually seen. When its overdone (HDR effects and aftereffects) its no longer photography but more along the lines of digital art (nothing wrong with that, as long as that's what was intended). Just my two cents...

I would like #1 if it were more realistic. It's OK to have blacks.

argyle wrote in post #10979689
Not a fan of the aggressive tonemapping...pretty much takes them out of the realm of 'photography' and puts it more in the realm of 'digital art'. The fountain scene has excessive halo-ing around the clouds and trees, not to mention the black clouds (also a result of the tonemapping). Personally, I think the composition of the stream is the best of those posted and would have been a winner if left natural (no tonemapping)...the tonemapping seems to have taken away any 'pop' and left it a bit flat. As far as the sunset images goes, if you don't have a GND filter, try two exposures (one for sky, one for foreground) and blend them afterwards. There's nothing inherently 'wrong' with HDR, if its used properly to reflect what the eyes have actually seen. When its overdone (HDR effects and aftereffects) its no longer photography but more along the lines of digital art (nothing wrong with that, as long as that's what was intended).
Just my two cents...

I can see what you mean about the digital art thing. Very interesting point.
Thanks for your feedback.

J Michael wrote in post #10979848
It's OK to have blacks.

What do you mean by this?

Mr. Blue wrote in post #10980406
What do you mean by this?

I think he is missing absolute blacks in your image - but then not every scene has them.

Why should I have absolute black shooting a white piece of paper? (exaggerating here I know)

Right, I said it's OK to have blacks, not you must have blacks. In the image in question there are areas that would naturally look dark. That was the whole point - the processing makes the scene look unnatural.

I don't think you're exaggerating at all. But, consider that a piece of white paper on a desk in a room with a window might be nearly black in the image if one wanted to emphasize the view through the window.