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Landscape Critique Part 2

Lesson 8 from: Photo Week Image Critique Hosted by Sue Bryce

Sue Bryce, Lindsay Adler, Brooke Shaden, Michele Celentano, John Greengo, Peter Hurley, Vanessa Joy

Landscape Critique Part 2

Lesson 8 from: Photo Week Image Critique Hosted by Sue Bryce

Sue Bryce, Lindsay Adler, Brooke Shaden, Michele Celentano, John Greengo, Peter Hurley, Vanessa Joy

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Lesson Info

8. Landscape Critique Part 2

Lesson Info

Landscape Critique Part 2

Hey beaver pond tetons schwab walker landing that when I can tell you yeah okay schwab walker landing and grand teton national park wyoming I would love to be there right now floating down the river paula brother right time a year I think well, they've got a beautiful reflection it's gorgeous you can't go in thousands they've got some nice light the foreground there's some little grass is kind of bottom right hand corner that they're okay I don't like the position I know this location really good I would have crossed I would've gotten out of that entirely and just had straight up reflection with grasses and middle element or embraced it so there was somehow grass all the way through with water in the middle it feels like we're on an angle and it never really got there feels like one direction or the other that it could have been improved I would have I would have tried getting right now in the water level to shooting like six inches above the water to get pure reflection. What would yo...

u have gotten the reflection at the water level? Ho yeah, absolutely, absolutely. I think there's a nice vertical in here with just kind of like the main peaks and we want to get those grasses out of the bottom I would like to keep him I could kona man I yeah, I would yes I like that better for sure or if the grass was consistently throughout the whole bottom of the frame right right it did just that it's heated out now just distracted so yeah if you can find is this now is this a river is this zoo think it's a beaver pond so I think it's it's sort of it's an offshoot of the snake river that that's kind of been channeled in on dh sits it's quite large in the area and there's there's it's also quite populated so this is definitely a sunrise and at sunrise and you will be one of probably fifty photographer find a is a weak vying for position and I bet you that such adventure this would be awesome in october issue with some nice color on the place yeah yeah and then you'll have one hundred photographers issue it's a great spot though who looks like a nice location it does I'm thinking may feels like maine but I'm going to I'm going to guess you're going to give us three letters here maybe are the um is it's not as bad as the other one though I feel I mean it's definitely there I do want to add I like you said before I want I want to add some most amusing and definitely changes I mean still over process but it's it's not it's right on that line of it's a little over if um yeah it's more than I would go yeah that's for sure I could see it maybe again using working something from again from a sale side that's my thing I would see an image like this every now and then license we do license I've seen actually really a sure shots license before surprisingly but I would say your chances air right around one to two percent versus and on hdr image buyers are not taking to them and so if you think about that they're not taking to him and they're trying to relate to their audience than what your race yard images what audience are they relating to other hdr fans more than anything yeah so I guess it just depends on what your what your goals are. I think the blacks and you're at it helped I think so I think they you know, were there at the best time of the year they got some great colors in there and the geese what if they are they're perfect they're facing the right direction. They look good area pastoral and I'm not a big fan over on the left hand side there's like a channel or a tunnel going a bridge yeah how do you feel about square images? Um a little square about square images you know I'm a purist in my prop in generally I would on ly crop I guess I'm again I just I'm from the old film days and I've just never let it go entirely in the sense that I like a traditional uncrossed dimension I'm just used to it but that's just me being old and fickle I think what you just did it is perfect for the image I think it definitely worked better and as you said which I think is a great point nothing I had something I hadn't really thought about being stuck in my always in some ways was social media it's like who cares what the dimensions are the image if you want to share this and you're getting rid of resolution but who cares because they're not selling the images you're sharing it and trying to convey something then why not drop it? I mean you've got to keep an eye on facebook these days because they take a horizontal image and all crop it into whatever square they could fit it's something funny with the verticals and so I mean I would fully expect this on a calendar out of the grocery store yes, I agree with that but I like your shopping it's good and I think they chose a nice little shutter speed to get that little blur in the water way kind of expect that so then the pretty good job pretties bomb oh ok there we go so we're at uh marine like way got interesting spot wait have you shot there much? No, not much I was there many years ago in starting out actually and I fell in love with it immediately isn't so are just so you know I've always wanted to go back and haven't had the opportunity um I was there a couple of years ago and I was I was in the area for about five days and this was like the spot number one on my list to go to because it's just it's a great spot on and I spent probably four mornings there waiting for good life playing around down at the canoes shooting right exactly where they were shooting I don't really like the rocks the kind of clunkiness in the bottom right hand corner of this I'm looking up at the very top edge of this picture and it looks like there's some clouds that are building and beautiful but I would love to see more of those classes to do with like mamet this way what we've lost all the darks let me give you some blacks we'll give you some things on this one you know I think one of the reasons I think for each day are like I'm opposed to the blacks or anything to salvage its zx really really processed up towing mapping is crazy and I get it I tried using nd filters here on the traditional view of the lake from the rocks that are kind of elevated and there's a lot of pine trees that come up through the frame and when you use an indy, you just lose all detail in them and now this was slide film, so there wasn't like I was going to go in dodge them right on by remember being really, really challenging to try and get the composition with nd filters so I think from, you know, shooting layers and combining them later is not actually a bad way to go if you're trying to get a particular result and you're ok with that process, however, a very everything's so neutral it's it's, it's, neutral that's my feeling on it. Yeah, I like what you said at the clouds I am I want to see more, and I think a vertical could've been interesting, but I like I like I think they could've worked the foreground elements and there's they started to get some reflections of the mountains, but they kind of cut off the highest peak right in the middle in the bottom end, so not that really kind of, you know, the problem that I have with h d r is that I get the feeling that a lot of people are trying to use it to add a punch to their photographs it's like they're trying to make up for bad light or bad subject and you've got a good subject to work with here think that their light was that bad and I think they're light is good and so it's like you need to do this, you're going too far that's a lot of potential again a beautiful shot has so much potential and I think the raw material materials are mostly there agree with you good observation I didn't notice that right away on the bottom but not like maker break on the shot because there is so much colored vibrance going on I think somewhere there is a file that couldn't be saved yeah, if I was there, I would probably get even lower and I'd be might be moving down to find these rocks because there's some rocks down here that have great patterns and some great colors red and that rock like the right hand corner, this stick is starting to threaten that I don't like that it's getting their clothes it's too big to move out of there too. Okay, so uh this is I'm thinking canyon lands and it looks like the green river quite uh white white rim trail and it's a beautiful place to shoot I don't think here in the right place at the right time of day hayes is pretty bad nothing going on in the sky it's a gorgeous location equating it too much of an emotional response doesn't work for me it feels like a vacation snapshot it does it does you need to come back you know first thing in the morning last thing at night you've got to get a car down there. Yeah it's it's it's not pointed in the right direction. Okay, we got a little bit smaller file size why'd you give such a small when this is looking pretty good how do you highlights? Look at the highlights look pretty good over here. Let me just darken him up a little bit for you I'm just gonna let me do just a little bit of us split andy here. So many people processing and you wouldn't process of j peg only right? You don't know I was worth a try. Yeah way we're doing what we have to do, folks. Yeah, that looks good so they have chosen a better place to be they've got better light than the last one because in some ways these two these are the same shots now. Essentially they look like to the same place in nearby or could be yeah, very different approaches to it definitely processing going on, but it doesn't feel over done I also I like, I don't know what do you think? What do you think of the fact that your eyes drawn to that bright spot in the middle of the river you get dead center uh I would prefer to be someplace else I could very well see, the problem is I'm a bad critic in the sense that I can empathize with them photographing going I rushed to the spot I got on the car iran two miles to get there. This was the only place to shoot everything else with, you know, there's problems on and you know, they're racing that light you know that light was going fast yeah, yeah I mean, that was that's a you know, three minutes of time right there and that it was a completely different shot. No, I would prefer to have that someplace else and the problem is is that if you turn to the left, you start losing the good light and if you turn to the right, you started losing some of the good content in the land on the left hand side but there might be something there cropping it over to the right if I could just pan this if there was a feature in light room where I could pan beyond what they actually photographed right, that would be fine I'm going on in here like a little dodging and burning on a little overzealous yeah, we didn't have one why is this not? Oh, you know what they did ok naughty, naughty, naughty they framed it so that we can't see the whole picture don't do that, folks, there we go. So now we can go and see this little bit way have a little bit more to work with and so way are actually not bad. Look, let me just should sharp and see what we can pull up here. I don't mind the river in the middle too much because I think it is this curve here on the right that that kind of helps keep the eye line moving. Okay, I'll get technically nerdy on you here. You probably don't need f twenty two in this case. There's nothing really close to the frame. You could probably shoot this eleven or sixteen and you have a little extra sharpness in your lands just getting a little nerdy on you there, okay, but pretty sharp don't would have loved to have been there. Shooting would have been a fun evening chewed who? Ok, what am I looking at? Oh, I see what they're trying to do, but no yeah, not quite. We've got we've got a reflection that we don't write completely have we've got some some liken that looks kind of cool. Yeah, bottom like that's what I like it, I like the line. The light the lycan and the lines are looking really nice and I think there's something there get that down get the camera down really close to that vertical maybe and hopefully there's something in the may be some reflection that you can see of the white flowers can be nice but I don't think we need him I think the rock on the left is much more interesting yeah, I agree okay, but if I would've gotten lower try to maybe separate the butterfly a little more from its background that that left hand wings yes is being cluttered they're the right hand wing we like yeah, I mean that you got that clear space around it a subject needs a little bit of space separation from it and so hot up there that could be the screen, right? Yeah, I think this is this is hard to work with. I mean, because your subject is not going to be could you move over here a little bit? Early morning is the best time for butterflies in places like this because their wings they're still filled with do know they probably move a lot slower than what all that helps a little bit sometimes that it's pretty I like the fact that looks like it's low light so everything's pretty soft with most part but yeah, the way it needs to be fixed but again I'm not like wow I was actually working on a shot just the other day I took a picture of a term again up mount rainier kinda strange I was just walking along the ground leases term again burn and but I spent like fifteen minutes because it was popping its head up and I'm trying to play around move left to right get the background so I'm not getting those blown out highlights seen it so I can see the bird's head clearly without anything you know things growing out of the head or obstructing the front of it and so forth and this is the type of thing if if the butterflies around you've got to keep working it until you get that clean sheet great until they fly away or take it to clean shot okay where is this california are like we don't know this feels a little like katia yeah it could be a katya huh? I love the lines in the right hand bottom right hand side kind of aren't enough to the sun the reflection is a little blown out I'm not sure exactly on how to fix that it's just very kind of lost everything I don't know if you could use a polarizer to help see the rocks in the water it's a it's a pretty good location they've they've handled the highlights in the sky pretty well yeah they're well handled I probably wouldn't photographed into the sun went down and just probably it's so busy in this middle section and I get it it's looks turbulent, but I made it tried it as well and then made the decision and that's not to say that they didn't tried a really slow exposure without that water and move it out completely just go for the smoky, cool kind of let's see what they close version so there's one tenth of a second it's s o three twenty they could go down to one hundred or fifteen cameras, maybe with a polarizer as you suggest, to see the lines and wait for the sun to go down, you probably pick up another eight stops he would have had probably what is that to three second of exposure at least or maybe even waiting five minutes more for the sun to go behind that one little cloud that it's halfway behind there just to kind of even that out? Well, look, we're back, we're back in, he has more anyway, I am going to go book a ticket because I keep ceo for man uh it looks nice. I mean, look at the image not working for me by a beautiful location. Yeah, the right side is just way too dark with that those those big trees in the foreground we don't need over I've been I've been over here and I shot it there's there's kind of a river that flows out and at least when I was there you could kind of carefully make your way out on all these logs to shoot from to get a cleaner angle because you can see just looking at this photograph you want to go to the left if you want to get out to the left so that you could have a cleaner shot because you do have that canoe out in the likes even had that nice little human element how far is this from seattle's that's a day's drive is it it's a one day driving just you know it might be it might be a day and a half day and a half good place to go ok well star action here interesting milky way looks like people are taking their national park course on our astro photography and putting it to work let's take a quick look at their settings four rounds us that's what kills it kills and so kills it yeah and it's this something up with processing maybe a little bit on it too yeah a little over brighten the milky way is looking pretty good but it looks like that cloud in the bottom right is still getting light from the setting sun perhaps or a city I don't look they look like they're pretty far out there we're talking right in the right hand side that's just seeming very, very bright getting some sort of an artifact ing yeah, there it looks like there's some purple friends and may your lights and so for something you got to be careful you know? I mean like when your photo I'm going to be a little snoopy here and I am going to go take a look at what camera shot this um can twenty, sixteen hundred mark three I would have thought at you're sixteen hundred yeah, the settings air right you may be a little long know about thirty seconds is fine, but were those corners the bottom left and right corner are purple and they should not be purple I'm wondering if they said this is something I've did when first starting out with this kind of stuff like you've got to commit yourself to just standing around in the dark and I wonder if maybe they have like a headlamp bond or something and they kept kind of moving around and the cameras here and then they're moving around on either side of it and the light was getting picked up could be or it could just be something in the post process so something that this feels like is that they were they went out for a long hike there coming back hey, let me let me stop the car, let me get let me give a star shot here, so you gotta start shot but what you should have done and she should a hike off into the open field left and found something of interest that stuck up that you can photograph him other than the road it's ok. Or at least put your brand new car there had photographed her car. Just need new foreground composition. Keep working on the astro head in the right direction. Okay. All right. So you know where this one is? Yes, I do have a picture. This at a poster of us in my bedroom growing up? Yeah, of this mountain. Yeah, but I couldn't tell you what it's about it's about chuck's in and it's called, uh was color is called artist point or photographers point. I've seen the the picture I had in my room was in autumn. Yeah, and the autumn colors are great. I was actually planning a trip up there. I was earlier in june there and there's a place there's a boardwalk it's very easy to get to and actually over on the left hand side. You can see the road over here that you drive up the road, actually splits and drives around the lake and I wonder there's this business there's the side and so just a funny quick little story is I had a book on photograph in washington and I was I was looking at, you know, different places and there's a guy who gives very good guides about where to go and I was up there I just wanted to see is this where he photographed it and I'm like, wow, this was taken a really long time ago because the trees are very, very different and he talked all about about this is how he photographed here well, the actual story is is that there's another lake just a stone's throw across this lake where he photographed really has a different set of trees and you have kind of a different set of foreground there to work with and so there's actually two places to shoot this from. So this is mel chuck's in court it is one of the most photographed mountains in the world because it's super easy to get to and I don't know you might know about this, but on stock sales it's kind of a generic mountain that could be anywhere does so that's what in the world and so it's got it's like the teacher could selling really well, my only issue technically well, I don't like the sign in there and if you can position it so that there's a tree in front of it and I'm kind of tourney on for myself, I know what you would say I'm kind of torn on, I wouldn't want a photo? Shop it out of there now, but if I can position myself to minimize it and put a tree in front of the thing is so small I mean, you'd have to get pretty big for the kind of the scene, so I think most use case scenarios wouldn't necessarily be distracting though I can now see it I see it. Yeah, you can say the same thing with the road over on the left is that the road has gotta go yeah, so he's got to go but we can we can get out of there that's what you should be doing and frame move a little bit you know, great day I was going to say time of day everybody thinks everything needs to be like the pink end of daylight you know there's a lot of executing a lot of magazines I work with where they will run something in the middle of the day or or not middle of the day, but ended a light like three, four o'clock five o'clock light not actually the seven or eight o'clock light because it's bright and the colors air still vibrant in this and it's just still happier looking shocked mom, the truth is is that when you get to sunset, what happens is this whole lake and the trees on the far side of the lake are thrown indicia shadows and the only thing that has light is the mountain on it and it's gets to be really tough to balance those light darks and so there is kind of a magic time to photograph it before the sun's gone down too far this is a cool spot for star trails to yeah you know what the reflection in the wake and then you wouldn't see the road or the side yeah wouldn't naturally take it out of there right oh my gosh okay something's going on with so okay obviously these light rays have caused a little bit of commotion here they seem artificial they because there isn't anything in the air that would be causing that right there there should be some sort of fog and so one day I hate to admit this but I'll admit it a long time ago I had a star filter little filter that you could and I added some things that should never be admitted I used it why used it in one photograph that was that it was days later yeah I mean what it's it's distracting you don't need the raise I would have used a long lens cropped out the four around this branches bothering me you know there's not nothing terribly compelling the shots it's just not working yeah that overly darkened sky on half but not the other hand kind of area okay where part of my instinct is it's a. This is a game when we're trying to guess where it's at and I'm not gonna have an incredible geography but now mount chuck's is really depressed me I feel like I should be on that one beautiful location yeah I mean, I think the word of the day might be foreground yeah, I agree with you on that it looks like glacier national park in montana but it could be wrong about it look that for around it's like get off the trail yeah, if you're a photographer in off the trail I mean had you going down here shot over the trees up that valley anywhere from back over here and up there with lens you had a perfect day they had everything going for you the clouds those clouds thiss person were to describe what they like about this picture to me if you were to say pointed out they would say, well, I like this and I like this and like this they're not gonna say, well, that's pretty cool, you know? And so you have to think of that like and sometimes it's helpful to just shoot a shop look at it on the back your frame and so do I like everything about it or don't like this part here and that's really what I'm trying to get out, zoom in or figure out howto get that part here kind of thing so have at it with a cropped I like what I would actually do if I was there, you know? And there wasn't a lot of places she like I would go stand right where my crosshairs are out here tio come and then shoot forward from that depending on what the foreground is. But this whole bottom side is that I'm sure there is. Let me what do you want to know? Wanted aware let's see if that already some say improving in the crop by the way, let's see if we've been doing that a doubt I met it that it lets go that's good that's gonna wait here we go, it's your national park. So congratulations. I should st mary's lake trail. Okay, gorgeous and so way obviously don't have all the information to crop exactly where we want to. But let's, just get the trail out of there. And now we obviously you know, do we want to deal with lake in there or not? We can just crop it out. Uh, thanks. Pretty nice. I know it's weird guys a little bit just they need to be off to the side more to get a little bit more. Yeah, there is a potentially a really nice panoramic in here, it's, just with those super steep cliffs group, looks good yeah, and processing looks good and those skies you know you know a lot of people it's so funny I tell people when you're watching the news and the newscaster school crazy it's a perfectly sunny day there's not a cloud that could be seen anywhere so I understand you that's like maybe somewhere down the list of you know what? You want to see it you know, clouds that air nice, puffy and like this they don't come around that often okay foreground pokes foreground I mean I thought we're gonna keep this going this's geography when we got it sharp I mean, look at this they really got it sharp on this one they come eleven? What are they using here? Seventeen to forty amazing she wasn't beanbag chairs, you know, you have one two, maybe three interesting rocks rocks a little hot tio seems like that again e there could be some interesting something over here. Yeah, but I like that what action going on up there on the right. See that little expiring? Yeah, I would have probably maybe a well a magic have you could have lined up those two rocks or those three rocks with bird or something, right idea I think again good really good effort on this one a lot you know right idea, right, mood and atmosphere but I agree with your sort of with your composition I really need to find him where the cameras because they chose in a pretty good part of the lake and this is kind of unusual in a lake where it's really shallow where you can see the bottom rocks there's a very nice pattern there and one of the tips that given my classes and I think I saw it in your class do is before you set up the tripod just get the camera and figure out where is that you really want to be in one of the things that I've started doing is like I get the camera exactly where I want and then I looked down on the ground and I find out what rock flower marking on the ground is exactly where I want my camera and I will get my tripod and I set it up this close to that good advice that is that is that is the way to do it and I did it you did this again this is not where you would end up you know you okay? Oh looks like glacier to it's like we have some or that or that could be actually here in the er okay let's get nosy we'll go check the keywords you know I'm just getting obsessed no key words on this way sure saying there is like same area what did you just put that in there that that's that's from the suggestions you're reading things into what you want to be I have this fascination with glacier national park I love it I'm also desperate to go back what a great sunset! Um, look, highlights are a little hot in the bright over there in general, I'm thinking like an nd all the way across also this four round does nothing may I want a home in? I think probably my guess is I know john here is going to say and that's panoramic, you know, and this is this is highly unusual for me, but I do a lot of classes with creative life, and they broadcast in a sixteen by nine aspect ratio and already sixteen by nine and a lot of tvs and that's just kind of a standard with you like it or not, the mother it will go to, so I kind of keep that is a an automatic crop if I'm going to go to a white panorama and one of the later. One of the things about cropping your image out of the three by two is that it immediately makes your image look different than everything else, right? Just to some degree now you can go crazy with it. I like the sixteen by nine I like to buy one aspect ratio on dh, then it starts getting kind of extreme three by one but sixteen by nine here and then we would have done this without cropping and losing resolution of course could have been a stitch three vertical right couple horizontal ls and then crossing do you do much panorama stitching I enjoy it I do I don't do a lot of it it's mostly just yet but I enjoy it and I have nothing opposed to it I think it's a great way to preserve resolution and really just maximize the scene if it works but you can look at that area on the top that we've cropped out and you know if it's not adding to the photograph it's taking away from the photograph so the blank white skies you know one of the common mistakes that a lot of people make yeah potentially really good color just getting work that situation but this is a raw file there might be more they could do to for you ok they went on a hiking trip yeah I'm gonna just go right out and say I very rarely does the back of someone's head work a side angle maybe it's not to say never but you immediately lose connection and you know I can go with the back of a person if I can see the trail yeah and it puts me in there she was a little bit better but obstructed by the rock here you could have shot them a little bit more to the left it looks like a the colors are just funky on this and it looks like a seventies photograph looks like a seventies films can it's looks like a film scan let's let's see if we're right if I I don't know if we can even tell um, I'm gonna guess it is a scan because we don't have any camera information in here and it's a scandal you have a little sound effect. Well, they got a nice moment. Go, lise, this is, um yeah, it's a good moment. I like clouds thiss the foreground that the little reads in the bottom left hand cropped out it's not a good photograph it on my screen it's seeming a little oversaturated is it the blues? R a little intense. It looks better up here on the big screen like that saturation you're going to see that get a little second and think it gets a little being a little punchy everyone's got their own little taste. Haste? Yes, I'm pretty cool and so I'm going to just say and let's just make it let's just go full scale black and white uh, let's make this one more contrast a little dingy let's break here level seemed like they were just yeah, yeah, and so some subjects just need to be brighter. Some subjects need to be darker, this's your you're making it makes a big difference isn't it yeah and so I mean now that tree is just got really snappy lines to it yeah yeah great composition I really like the composition yeah, I think they did well finding a nice graphic element for the foreground something else in the background the leader eyes to take a stake in yeah place one who look at that wow that's pretty cool let's go with f sixteen of twenty to twenty two come on drum roll please it's not showing it to me I can't do this forever way sound effects it's been it's been all stripped out of here they stripped it may strip the minister they stripped all the metadata that's why wasn't coming out maki sneaky uh small aperture big up the field bryant twenty was extended if your goal is for us to talk about lens flair you got it yeah foreground not really doing it we've gotten some I mean there's good lens flare and there's bad lens flare and this one's a little konkey especially is like a big hot spot on the left there's some potentially interesting clouds in the background and that valley looks like there could be something interesting happening with that side light coming in is this this looks like holly I'm not familiar to me why or something caesar cinder cone so it's like some sort of all candidates all right I don't mind it I mean it's definitely flare e you know plus you're getting into waiting tables and you need a lot of flair this's it's a little more flair than I think I would like normally eyes that an office space reference you know that's what you use any sort of commercial but yeah it's sze probably something else that could have been done and also because it happens in the sun hits the horizon it gets below the clouds and white comes up through it right yeah, there might have been other options I think yeah they're foreground wait a little round a little bit what am I looking at way are a long ways away pink from a boat in some people and way have just way too much blank space for me just I mean there's some interesting it is not like a big compelling something yeah, I mean there's there's kind of a nice little s curve over here in the right hand side the whole left side isn't adding anything. I don't really want to take it square feeling square though on I just it's not it doesn't have a subject I mean yeah, yeah I think this improves it because now that boat anchors it gets a little bit bigger, you need it when you have subjects in the frame they need to be big enough that you can lock onto them and identify all right work with him in some ways and I think it was just too small before they're going after real abstract but it got so abstract it just started a fall off the the right way and we don't have any information here and so maybe just a little bit longer on the tele photos in winds we got next okay pink pink, pink, pink, pink foreground for ground foreground birds flycatchers thiss make sure your sensors clean oh, yeah look at look at them they're upside down our reflection well that's what your age is like this bird's not quite get well then I realized that I'm really actually this is perplexing because some of them are right side up there's the reflection so their reflection but don't they seem awfully small for where they are some things they look like they should be the size of a bumble bee there it's look it's a pretty shot I mean, the birds you kind of, you know, interesting whatever I mean it's not the runs. The birds are like totally freaking me out here because they're not the right size for grass too much hitchcock for you that's right? There might be some more interesting char lines they're much more interesting little ponds of water defendant could see over there in the kind of working towards the background I think you do have some beautiful greens here. Yeah, I like the green I like the light you know it za beautiful looks like it's a beautiful day having kind of thing I could really get a sense of what it felt like to be out there but yeah, but it's it's just that I would keep working this anymore people they see and love to see more of their near frames that they took and get an idea where is this arches national park just like I don't know that he wanted that much water in churches you know that the right time, the right time you could see it I've seen some back there before I thought but if that same piece actually that same fania and a pool at night you know it's, this is it's it I think good, good try for what they have I like what you're doing with the cropping, you know, the sky is so lackluster that doesn't mean anything waited maybe even later in the day didn't get the shadows a creep in and yeah, the light loses all its color and you know, what can you do? You're there you can you pay somebody, could you put some clouds up there? I would take a hand, okay, I'll tell you just I would move to the left because the thin on the right we could get more of that reflection but that kind of cut skyline there yeah yeah there there would be a bit more payoff moving a bit to the left yeah, great. All right you know, I think we're down to our last one here. Well ok family jasper um do you recognize the doc? It feels like the doc from the very beginning genocide actually it doesn't look like the same thing is there are a lot of it is because look there's that rocket was peeking over the edge that could be today the same so it's just so maybe forensics today a creative live we will analyze oh, man, I already know what I think of this. What do you think? Well, the thing that you don't want just like this through these three little leaves poking up out of the bottom these elements yeah and over here all of this all of that so like this one patch of grass if you can see where my cursor is that's nice that's got a nice element to it it's got a nice reflection to it's not graphic lines but on the left this is not working as good framing see it's out of focus so it's a distraction and I'm being told that it is lake louise in banff, canada and I I might disagree with that you guys, I was there I was there two years ago this isn't like a week I walked around the half way of what you can of lake louise is very containing a bold yeah I don't know where this band and so that was that was some erroneous information I'm sorry where that came from I'm not sure but we apologize for that so yeah, ok and we're not quite there on the white either. Um yeah it's a little short look, I think I would have I would have cropped in here or to use this is my four around element I would have kept these grasses I just would have tightened up twenty four to seven he probably would play around getting somewhere mid telephoto range homed in on this reflection loved the color love the blue that you get on the mountains the docks a little distracting perhaps I would have just figured out a different way to crop it out moved along the wake I would've just again who were reworked the compensation right idea, right time of day thinking of all the right things but again just falling a bit short not paying attention to the sharpness the depth of field yeah, almost there, but not quite okay well, that brings us to the end of the photos thank you everybody for sending in photos who greatly appreciate having something to work with? Yeah, I thought in a hole really good. I mean, I thought, you know, it's it's a process? Yeah, you know, talk. It was a process. A lot of people I think, have put themselves in the right place. I think they need to continue working the scene yes, and not get so satisfied or, you know, get locked in. I want to get this one shot, right, and just work it, work it, work it right and don't be afraid to go back a second day because sometimes things get better and I think they spent all week there. I know you'll drive your family fire like, uh, that's what? It takes his time somebody just completely appeared. I was watching the camera, too, and they also me slipping. Um, I have to say the feedback is how remarkable that you are critiquing on light room, john, because your adjustments showing adjustments to something like landscape photography makes a significant difference to being able to help people improve something that you can see, particularly with the dropping. So the the question I have is you keep saying in the field to andy filter, I'm a big in the field to use it whenever I shoot any video, because I love to have, you know, one point two or you know, one point, eight or two point two, and I can't do that in bright light, you know, I can't be that wide open and bright light with that shallow depth of field, so I love the indy filter. How often are you using it? What he in which in the field? Because everybody says, what are you using? I use and nine stop in, you know, I didn't indy filter, and I really love it. What do you use what he love? Because she said it about a thousand times? Well, let's, clarify something because we are talking about different things. You're talking about a solid neutral density filter, yes, and that's used for two reasons. One is so that you can achieve those one point four apertures, for instance, I will also occasionally use them if I'm trying to slow down a river really slow. I have a six stop that aiken slow down the river down to, like four seconds because you're coming in alright, equally throughout the whole exactly the indy that we were referring to is kind of the slang term is the sp flip indy, where it's darker on the top half in clearing, graduating angel density that's the full name of it, yes, and graduated dandy gradually graduates it's we're always just saying this is the end get the india and they go because nobody asked me that question, but I was so intrigued by the fact that you keep saying that I had toe I rely on him eighty percent of my landscape photos I would say incorporate them in the field and I have definitely moved away from always using him in the fields and you know, if I'm gonna rush or feel like it's, not that drastic of a shift all rely on on the photoshopped version of nd um so I think there are important may I certainly going to hear details um, in the national park course, I think we went into three hours of your offensive filters and how to use them balancing and it's a technique that's this is taking the many, many years to figure out perfect and it's still something it's not perfect. So like anything as I said earlier in the process, I keep him with me all the time actually have a little built path and when I go out shooting it's like there right there and said I could grab him quickly to use him like to throw them on rocks and anything I can to scratch them that's great this's so you want to shoot landscape mme or you want to set the landscape? This is differently patty your tools that you need to know one of those secret tools that a lot of people know about but it's one of those critical ones that you know if you lost all your indy filters while you were out shooting your habit you know I would just feel I mean, I was like I would have to start shooting multiple exposures and then have to work and combine them later would be the only way that I could do it in the field but I really don't like shooting like that because there's certain times where there's things happening that you have to capture it in a single shot integral to the process tio crafting a composition, working a scene from spot to spot and getting the results you want versus settling on a spot and then getting layers and saying this is the only spot this is going to capture the nine frames within a leader emerge yeah and then you really have a different level level of commitment versus being allowed to slap a filter on and moving to three different spots without having a new six exposures and each bob yeah wasn't much quicker and maximize the amount of light that you might have at the end of the day or in the morning the other aspect I like about using them over other techniques is I'm visual I get to see things in the field it's like you could literally take it over the land and sea in the viewfinder. You can see it on the lcd. You can see. Ok, that was not enough. I got to grab this one and use this one and so it's instant feedback.

Ratings and Reviews

Peggy Nugent
 

I learned a lot as always from the portrait critiques- I've watched them multiple times because I can see the impact to my images when I follow the guidance provided in the critiques. Sue Bryce is great, as always. I really appreciated Brooke Shaden's and Michele Celentano's viewpoints as well. I found the wedding and commercial segments interesting and informative as well, though they are not my particular interests. The landscape segment -- come on, guys, all the images submitted to Creativelive, and you could not find one that prompted you to say "Wow! Great shot!" Seriously? The closest to an enthusiastic response was for one beautiful Grand Canyon shot, where significantly more time was spent discussing what was wrong rather than what was done well. And it was a great shot! It's helpful to the audience to have you point out what was done well, and whoever took that shot deserved to hear it. (FYI, none of the images were mine, so I'm not fishing for compliments.) Maybe it was a long week and you were tired, but have another coffee next time and bring a little enthusiasm. The other segments were much more encouraging, inspiring, and helpful.

Student Work

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