It took 8 years, but finally my 1000th post!

Krioni

Golden Member
Feb 4, 2000
1,371
0
71
First, let me say that the pictures are just some that I took around the outside of my house over the weekend. I know that my lens apparently had a few spots on it. I'm mainly asking if you guys could comment on the composition of the pictures.

The buzzard picture isn't really there for critique... I just thought it was kind of cool that I caught it with its wings fully spread. That's a pretty serious crop.. so it doesn't look so great. I quickly pulled over in my jeep and swapped lenses, so it was an accidental picture.

The only post processing I did was an "I'm feeling lucky" in Picasa on a couple of them.

Click here to see the pics

Thanks in advance for your suggestions... and please, be gentle :)
 

jpeyton

Moderator in SFF, Notebooks, Pre-Built/Barebones
Moderator
Aug 23, 2003
25,375
142
116
If you have more than one lens, you can test to make sure the spots are from the lens and not dust on the sensor.

Colors are good but the composition is off; you need to work on framing your shots. Picture 2 would be better with more (or all) of the lamp post, picture 3 would be better with the surrounding hills, and picture 4 could have a better angle on the flag.

The nice thing about digital is that cropping is easy. If you're still developing your photographic 'eye', shoot wider next time to capture more of the scene and worry about cropping the picture down later.
 

Krioni

Golden Member
Feb 4, 2000
1,371
0
71
Thank you for your comments. I will check out the lenses to make sure I don't have dust on the sensor... thanks for the tip!

Pic2: That's about as much of the post as I could get without getting a lot of the tree that's sitting directly next to it (to the right).

I took a bunch of the flag, but I wasn't sure which one was the best... I can post more if you or others would be willing to look at them.

Thanks again for your comments. I really appreciate you taking time to give me constructive feedback.
 

ucdbiendog

Platinum Member
Sep 22, 2001
2,468
0
0
#1 (lamppost): I like this alot minus the tree on the side. crop that out and it's damn good composition. maybe try saturating the blues a little more.
#2: too much sky in this one, look up the rule of thirds. thats where yhe horizon should be near. sky is funny color too, maybe too saturated?
#3: Shoot wider on this one to catch more flag. the little splotch of land on the bottom right is out of place, either put more land there or take it out completely. I like the idea of the shot though, excellent lighting too.
#4: I think this picture needs a more dramatic sky (sunset) to work. little tight on the cropping, but cool angle.
#5: I like the lighting on the other flag picture better, but the composition on this one better, but again, moer flag would be better I think.
 

Krioni

Golden Member
Feb 4, 2000
1,371
0
71
Thank you very much for your comments. I will take them and learn. Like I said in the original post, I didn't really do any post-processing. Would a circular polarizer have helped with the sky in these pictures?
 

Krioni

Golden Member
Feb 4, 2000
1,371
0
71
Originally posted by: ucdbiendog
#1 (lamppost): I like this alot minus the tree on the side. crop that out and it's damn good composition. maybe try saturating the blues a little more.
#2: too much sky in this one, look up the rule of thirds. thats where yhe horizon should be near. sky is funny color too, maybe too saturated?
#3: Shoot wider on this one to catch more flag. the little splotch of land on the bottom right is out of place, either put more land there or take it out completely. I like the idea of the shot though, excellent lighting too.
#4: I think this picture needs a more dramatic sky (sunset) to work. little tight on the cropping, but cool angle.
#5: I like the lighting on the other flag picture better, but the composition on this one better, but again, moer flag would be better I think.

#1, I edited the lampost picture as you suggested and posted it... would you mind taking a look at the edited version?

#2, it's composed like that because I'm shooting from my back yard and that was the only way to not include all of the houses in my neighborhood. Maybe I just need to take a trip down the road and get closer, beyond my neighborhood?

#3, Yeah, that land looks fugly in there... good call.

#4, Thanks... That's the front of my house, so it should be easy enough to wait for a more dramatic sky as you've suggested. Thanks.

Thanks again for your help!