Critique Please - Seascape

[ehughes]

Let me know what you REALLY think ? :D

Ed

http://ehughes.smugmug.com/photos/25923134-L.jpg

[DavidTO]

The quality of the light is awesome, the exposure/processing look pretty good, but the compo seems a bit tight to me, I feel restricted in a scene I want to see so much more of, and I think it lacks the clear definition of what exactly I should be looking at.

[Andy]

The quality of the light is awesome, the exposure/processing look pretty good, but the compo seems a bit tight to me, I feel restricted in a scene I want to see so much more of, and I think it lacks the clear definition of what exactly I should be looking at.

:agree and also, while the long exposure works nicely for the water, the fuzzy plants in the foreground are blurred now ...

[John Mueller]

Nice color.:thumbI would do away with the foreground.Go with the rocks in the sea.

[Mongrel]

I agree with the others pretty much-

the lighting is wonderful
the exposure is dead on
the 'scene' itself is beautiful

But, like the others two things stand out-

the shot feels tight
the blurry plants in the foreground bother me a bit

I think if you cropped out the foreground you would actually open the picture up and allow it to breath more.

It's still a *keeper* it just needs some tweaking-imho-to bring it home.

[ginger_55]

Ed, boy am I in for it when I post here, you all will have your rifles out.

Uh, I still would have to say that my first impression is that I don't like it.

And I have enjoyed reading everyone else say the same thing in language I am not always sure I understand.

I assume that you were trying something new, or something. What were you trying to do?

ginger

And to make this critique as thorough as others have tried to be, I will so say here, :agree with what :smack said.

So far, as a critiquer, I have enjoyed this forum. I am probably going down in flames shortly.

Ed, I usually adore your work, where did you get this idea? And why did you think any of us would not tell you what we really think?

What were you trying to do??????? I am sure we can get this straightened out, but to get there, we need to know where we are going.

[jwear]

HI ED not advice you know i know better than me giving advice so just opinion .DAVID said it all great advice -the color and light to me looks great

[ehughes]

Thanks folks, I appreciate it...

Ed

[Dee]

OK here goes.

I'm very attracted to the colors and the detail and color in the rocks right in front of the water is awesome! The exposure is great.

My first thought was "what is that fuzzy stuff on the rocks" lower left.

Composition wise, I'm not too sure what the subject is, the fuzzy plants, the crashing wave, the sky and sea?

I can't seem to lock on to a compositional flow, my eye seems to wander from fuzzy plants to wave washing over rock in the distance...

I really wanted to like this because of the marvelous light, colors and exposure, but the fuzzy plants and the composition is really throwing me off.

Love that area, BTW...

[Mike Lane]

Well I like the foreground, the gold colors compliment the sky very well. My thought is that you could perhaps shoot from a lower angle (and at a faster speed to stop the blur of the plants). Get the foreground up closer to the crashing wave in the distance. Put the horizon on the bottom third and zoom out.

Or if the crashing wave was your focus, pick up your gear and move closer to it somehow. It is too far away to be real effective if you've got everything else in the scene. Alternately, make the crashing wave your focus by zooming in on it and contrasting the colors of that rock with either the water in front of it or the sky above it.

Or on third thought this could work from here but IMHO you should embrace the foreground. Get lower, maybe go verticle, get the green plants that are in the shadow out of the shot if you can.

Of course there may be limitations here as far as geography that I don't know about. Maybe there's a big ugly fence or a road or a trash can right behind you that prevents you from moving back.

[ginger_55]

Everytime I look at that photo, I think of my daughter who works in a microbiology lab. She is a supervisor now, but still gets down and dirty sometimes.

So, I have been wanting to ask: Is it contagious?

I know that no one else has been as negative as I have, but I know your work, Ed, you had a reason for posting this.................I just don't know what it is.

On top of being biologically afraid of the yellow stuff, the ocean does not appeal to me. Reminds me of a night last year when things just didn't work for me where I was.

My eye wants to escape the bad foreground stuff, but it doesn't know where to go in the background, if that makes any sense.

ginger

[lynnma]

Hi Ed, my first thought when I opened this shot was "Oh Wow!" and then I was distracted by the foreground. I agree that it's a bit tight. The colors are wonderful. I think it would be a marvelous "reshoot" with different exposure times etc. Love the subject matter. Is the horizen tilting like one pixal or so off down on my left? just caught my eye (or it may be me leaning:D ).