I've been sitting on this for a couple of weeks, wondering whether I should file it, toss it, or post it. But every time I come back to it, I like the look for some reason I can't explain - the light I guess. The technicals aren't all that great. The whitish area is a small creek covered with algae, which just happened to reflect mostly white in this case.

Toss it, Dale. For something like this you need tack sharpness and this shot is just plain soft. Even with tack sharpness I'd have to ask what the focal point is in this picture and what it is you want to convey with it.

I understand what you're saying, heh. The reason I didn't add more sharpening is because I haven't found a way to prevent exaggeration of leaf highlights on this type of image, due to the contrasty lighting. And indeed I did consider tossing it, but I kept coming back to it because it looked better than the other 95 similar images I had in the inbox. You're right, I can't find a single argument for why it's worth keeping, so maybe it's the velvet Elvis engrams I have, I dunno.

Dale, The problem isn't post-processing sharpening. For something like this, unless you have a camera like the Nikon D3 that'll do high ISOs comfortably, and an image-stabilized lens, you need to shoot off a tripod, using mirror-up if possible, and use an aperture of somewhere around f/16 or better so you can get some serious depth of field. You'll get some diffraction softening at that aperture, but it's the kind of thing you can bring back under control in post-processing. This particular picture is just plain too soft coming off the camera. That's the technical problem, but the aesthetic problem is even worse. In your tower of babel picture you had a subject: an interesting, round structure thrusting up into a cloudy sky. In this picture there's nothing to focus on. I can understand why you're interested. You're familiar with the area. But other people aren't, so they don't have the attachment to it you have. Art has to be able to stand on its own feet. This picture doesn't do that.

Don't toss it. Play with it. Crop it, post process it. Learn from it, so next time you go out there you'll shoot better. I took your shot and tinkered with it a little in Photoshop and wound up with a nice picture.

There are very many nice views hidden in this one. I see at least 3 or 4. Narrower views or "just" details. I would go to this place at dusk or dawn and reshoot with even better lightning with a tele and tripod.

Christian



//edit: Why is the water so white? Is this some foam? Looks a bit strange to me, like pollution.

Pop, You've got to be kidding. That "nice picture" is grossly over-sharpened. You simply can't recover the kind of thing Dale posted. You're right about learning from this picture, though. Dale probably will do a better job of shooting, with a proper depth of field and a steady tripod next time. But all that doesn't eliminate the aesthetic problem: the fact that there's nothing there of interest to anyone except Dale.

Christian, Exactly! You don't play with something like this, trying to pry a worthwhile picture out of it. You learn you lesson, go back, and shoot again. This isn't street photography where you can't go back. It's not rocket science either.

Well in fact I did exactly that, I played with this image. I cropped some views from it and lightened the midtones. I did not post these results here, but my advice would be too, to play with the image to come up with some better views, wich could eventually be reshot. At least thats what I do with my images, try to find nice crops. These might be very very small sometimes, but they give me an idea on what things to focus next time.

Of course it would be better if I would calmly think about what I want to shoot in the FIRST place. But, there are many times where I dont have this time or routine to do this, or where I am not in the right mood. Then I just take the image nevertheless and play with it in post.

And to Dale:

I overread the algae-part in your first post, now I know what this foam is.



Christian

Christian, Sounds as if by "playing" with the image you mean to look at various parts of it to see if you can find a subject for a re-shoot. I'd certainly agree with that. But that's very different from trying to "recover" something worthwhile by cropping.

RSL, I think you need to get a grip. I wasn't trying to be Ansel Adams. Yes, it may have been over sharpened, but so what. Dale asked for advice on what to do with it and I recommended experimenting with it because maybe, just maybe, he might learn something from it. It's not like I was suggesting there might be an image he could sell to National Geographic hiding inside it.

Well, I won't argue with you about grips, but I'd say posting a picture that over-sharpened sort of indicates at least a minimal lack thereof. I'm glad to hear you weren't trying to be Ansel. That relieves my mind.

Yes, I hope Dale learns something from all this. There are technical lessons to be learned from the failure of this picture, but there are even more important aesthetic ones. The tower or babel shows that Dale can do good work. I hope he'll ponder why that picture is so much better than this one.

I just wanted to clarify what I said before (but probably not too clearly) - the reason I kept the photo was not because it had a particular interest to me, or familiarity per se - I kept it because after setting it aside, and then doing a quick review of the "inbox" every day or so for a couple of weeks, I was intrigued by the overall look, mainly the colors, textures, and lighting. The critique is good, though, since it tells me that when I figure out exactly what's right with this, I can work on minimizing the not-so-rights.