Burst of Warmth

[dseidman]

The Seattle area experienced some interesting weather for the first day of summer. There were really cool clouds overhead all day but I couldn't think of a good place to go. I eventually settled on Golden Gardens but my best shot of the day doesn't show the aforementioned clouds.

Canon 5D Mark II
Canon 17-40L

http://www.danseidmanphoto.com/photos/571101409_vLaWW-XL-3.jpg




I decided to try out a wider crop in order to remove some of the uninteresting top region of the image. I'd love to get some feedback on which one you prefer.

http://imgur.com/qEvIJ.jpg

[thapamd]

Magnificent shot, Danny! What a beautiful composition, with great FG textures and magical light. :thumb :clap

[UmmmHowsThat]

Excellent shot! I really enjoy that the horizon does not equally split the shot. And trees in the sand, now that's cool!

[dseidman]

Magnificent shot, Danny! What a beautiful composition, with great FG textures and magical light. :thumb :clap

Thanks! It was my first time attempting the sun star effect so I'm pretty happy that this turned out okay.

[dseidman]

Excellent shot! I really enjoy that the horizon does not equally split the shot. And trees in the sand, now that's cool!

Thank you. I'm considering a crop to bring the horizon up even higher. I feel the top part of the frame doesn't really add much to the image.

I'd like to get some feeback on what you guys prefer!

[thapamd]

I prefer the original, uncropped version.

[squirl033]

love the texture of the sand in the foreground, and the sun through the trees... this would even work well as a vertical crop, IMHO... take the middle third vertically. with 21Mp to work with, you could keep just that portion and still have a darn nice image!

[dseidman]

I prefer the original, uncropped version.

I appreciate you returning to give even more feedback! :thumb
I gave it some more thought and now agree with you. There was something that was still bothering me about the picture but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. I went back and re-edited it and have now put up the new version. The light is now slightly diffused with some richer colors.

[dseidman]

love the texture of the sand in the foreground, and the sun through the trees... this would even work well as a vertical crop, IMHO... take the middle third vertically. with 21Mp to work with, you could keep just that portion and still have a darn nice image!

Thanks for your comment! There's no need to crop because luckily I thought this through while taking the photo. :D
I probably took about 150 shots of this scene, including several verticals but I think I like this one the most out of all of them.

[Awais Yaqub]

Fantastic work Danny as usual i really like the 2nd version ! :thumb

[thapamd]

Nice job with the colors, Danny. I'm looking at the image again, and I think the picture looks a little rotated (CCW). It may just be an optical illusion because of the apparent horizon, but appearances are what count in pictures :D

[Benjer]

Beautiful shot with a great quality of light and good choice of exposure. I like both versions - I don't find the upper portion of the first to be distracting. The 2nd crop is perhaps more potent visually without the tree tops, but for some reason it appears to lack some of the warmth in the first. Did you lighten it up or reduce saturation at all?

[dseidman]

Fantastic work Danny as usual i really like the 2nd version ! :thumb

Thank you very much!

[dseidman]

Nice job with the colors, Danny. I'm looking at the image again, and I think the picture looks a little rotated (CCW). It may just be an optical illusion because of the apparent horizon, but appearances are what count in pictures :D

I did a little CCW rotation in post processing because the horizon looked a little slanted. Since I couldn't actually see a horizon line from this vantage and I don't have a bubble level, the rotation was a bit of a judgement call. Maybe I went a little too far. Man, this was a tough shot to process.

[dseidman]

Beautiful shot with a great quality of light and good choice of exposure. I like both versions - I don't find the upper portion of the first to be distracting. The 2nd crop is perhaps more potent visually without the tree tops, but for some reason it appears to lack some of the warmth in the first. Did you lighten it up or reduce saturation at all?

Sorry for the confusion. I didn't really do enough to clarify for those who didn't see the original post. The first image I put up had the same crop as #1 but the colors and contrast matched what you see in #2. I went back last night and did a re-edit to bring up the colors and create a more diffused look in the light. So the top image you are seeing has since been edited a second time and updated. It seems that most people aren't liking the cropped version so I should probably just take it down.
I hope this cleared things up a bit.