Ok, for what it's worth, here are my 2 cents. The first picture is my favorite, but in my opinion, there is too much of the floor and not enough of the ceiling showing. That solid dark triangle in the right front does nothing for the picture, I think that showing more of the wall area above the archways would be more interesting. Maybe a vertical composition, just concentrating on the archway on the right? #2 is nice, but #3 does absolutely nothing for me as I have no idea what it is or what you were trying to say with the picture.
Welcome to the forum, and keep posting! Reading critiques of other folks work is how we learn and improve.
Thanks! really much appreciated!
When I took first one I was not much aware of what I was doing, and now I realize how much a different observer can help in understandig a photo that you keep staring with the same eyes...
n.3 is a "crawler of a loader" (hope google translation makes it clear...)
I like the shot because, when one looks at it, is supposed to see the crawler in focus without understanding what it is, then look at the crawler in the background that is supposed to give a solid hint on the in focus object...
I guess it's not working as i expected!!!
too bad!
1 - I like number 1 the best, especially the placement of the hanging light. Good composition. As previously suggested, trimming some from the bottom foreground would make the image stronger. Also, I'd suggest darkening the highlights to show more exterior detail. You can do this with the curves adjustment layer in PS without losing any shadow detail. Point and click on the curve line to pin down the shadow detail before bring down the highlight portion of the curve.
2 - I like the color contrast with the red and blue and the shapes. I'd crop some from the top of the image to improve the composition. Agree with Scott, because the wire safety cage for the bulb provides an interesting part of the image, the image would be stronger if the wire frame were sharp rather than out of focus.
3 - The pitting and structure of the tread in the foreground is the strength of the image. It suffers from soft focus. I'd crop some of the bottom of the image and apply smart sharpen or the unsharp mask to help the texture of the near tread.
I like #1 but am puzzled by what appears to be different light sources (but I wasn't there so could be completely wrong). The interior light on the wall seems to cast shadows that are in conflict with the ambient light in the courtyard?
In #2, perhaps some of the apparent softness is noise? ISO 3200, f2, 1/25".
Played a bit with #1 in NX and then LightZone to warm a little and subdue highlights...did not bother with crop since there's not a lot of real estate to work with without the original.
I'm pretty new at this, but I'll give it a try. I'm not exactly much of an authority, of course, but at least you'll have another set of eyes to compare with.
1.) I really like what you did with the crop and exposure adjustments. In my opinion, it's a great shot! I feel like you could probably try enhancing the colors a bit like Bob did with his sample; have some fun and play around for a while. Because of the unusual lighting, this would be a great pic to tinker with.
2.) Given the high ISO, big aperture, and slow shutter speed, I'm pretty certain this would have been almost impossible to get right in the circumstances you were in. Did you try using a tripod? You'd have gotten some cool/weird "ocean blur" bokeh and I'm not sure if you wanted that or not for the image. It's always in the eye of the beholder.
3.) This new shot reveals much more to the viewer, in a good way. There's a distracting little "speck" of light in the upper portion of the photo that you may want to try retouching, if that's your thing. Otherwise, I think your initial goal is much clearer with this picture.
Good luck - it looks like you're having fun, and that's great! Pics 1 and 3 are very cool.
I would say the two edits improved the images. A little tweaking of the curves could retain a little more brightness on the hanging light. If you mask the image you could brighten the hanging like a little more, but the PS editing for that is a little more involved.
Another PS change you may like is to use perspective correction to reduce the lean of the doorway and arches do to the slightly upwards angle of the original image. (If you haven't done perspective correction: Click Select/All, Edit/Transform/Perspective, then click on the lower right corner of the image window and drag the frame down and to your right to put gray space around the image. Then click on either the tiny upper right corner square or the tiny upper left corner square and drag the square to the side a small distance. When you are satisfied, click return or enter to apply the change. Then deselect.)
If you enjoy editing your images it's a good hobby. You only burn time and electrons. Learning more about Photoshop gives you more tools to control your images. I'm still learning. Years ago I used to enjoy manipulation images in my darkroom to make them look more like how I remembered the scene. Now, I can manipulate them without mixing chemicals, washing bottles and bumping into things in the dark.
