This is my first time posting in Photo Critique, but I felt like I sharing some shots and getting some feedback on technique, post-processing, etc.
This first shot is a ocean landscape that I took, wow, almost a year ago, and I've always really like how it came out, but was curious what other people thought about it and about the post-processing on it. I feel like I add too much vignetting on a lot of more "artistic" shots. This one is no exception. Thoughts?
I hope to look at this later on my home monitor. Much better than at work.
One thing I would consider is correcting the wide angle lens distortion to reduce the curvature of the image. If, on the other hand, you like it, I'd exaggerate it much further.
I dont mind the vignette, but if you use automatic lens profile correction in ACR/LR, the vignetting will probably be lessened.
Scott
Yeah, I am at work at the moment too. The original file is at home on my hard drive. I am almost 100% positive I enabled LR3 lens profile correction on this. I added the vignetting in later.
As for adjusting for the lens distortion, wouldn't the lens profile correction take care of that? Should I tweak the correction further?
Is there a rule-of-thumb for vignetting in photos, or does it just depend on if the shot calls for it or if you think it helps guide the viewers' eyes to a particular part of the photo?
Not sure if the horizon is vertical. Check it.
Maybe I am wrong about the distortion. Could be perception with the vignette and comp.
Vignetting is a matter of taste and I often add some as you said, "it helps guide the viewers' eyes..". With a uniform sky, big expanse of water without varying features, the vignette will be more noticeable.
My baseline for comparison of the overall impression of an image is what I see by eye and what I see in your shot is water which far more saturated than I would expect. Exaggerated saturation will work for me sometimes, but only if it helps amplify the important content and message.
Which leads to my second criticism. It has nice compositional balance for a shot with a boat in the foreground heading towards the small distant focal point in the distance but without anything in the foreground it is unbalanced and because the ocean gets tuned out as negative space and it feels to bottom heavy.
The boat in the foreground while small creates the mental story light of "heading into port" better than a blank ocean and I cropped to balance the amount of sky and ocean. I think more natural seen by eye saturation and a similar crop will improve the overall balance of yours but without anything in the foreground it does't create any interesting story or stir any emotional reaction.
sbeme wrote:
Not sure if the horizon is vertical. Check it.
Maybe I am wrong about the distortion. Could be perception with the vignette and comp.
Vignetting is a matter of taste and I often add some as you said, "it helps guide the viewers' eyes..". With a uniform sky, big expanse of water without varying features, the vignette will be more noticeable.
Ah, yes. I do believe the horizon line is a bit tilted.
cgardner wrote:
My baseline for comparison of the overall impression of an image is what I see by eye and what I see in your shot is water which far more saturated than I would expect. Exaggerated saturation will work for me sometimes, but only if it helps amplify the important content and message.
Which leads to my second criticism. It has nice compositional balance for a shot with a boat in the foreground heading towards the small distant focal point in the distance but without anything in the foreground it is unbalanced and because the ocean gets tuned out as negative space and it feels to bottom heavy. ...Show more →
Great feedback. Thank you. Yes, perhaps I over-saturated the blue. I was playing around with split-toning for this shot. I guess I over did it. Secondly, yeah I wish there was some object like a boat or pier in the foreground for this shot. Definitely would have added some interest and balance.
To me, the curvature provides a sense of depth, but I will add that the image itself seems tilted to the let some so I would compensate for that (simple rotation; nothing fancy). Otherwise, any additional advice would be subjective and I'm not good at subjective. lol
The original file is at home on my hard drive. I am almost 100% positive I enabled LR3 lens profile correction on this. I added the vignetting in later.