Here's a shot from last night, have been experimenting with black and white conversion. What do you think? Sorry for the large image, but it just won't look right small!
Its an interesting, moody shot. I love the stars in the sky and the clouds look great. Since your are preserving details in the grasses it just doesnt look right to have so little detail in the trunk of the tree. I think you need to open up those shadows, preserving a good black point.
As far as size goes, it doesnt work to post much larger than 800 or 1000 tall. Many people will have to scroll, losing the benefit of seeing the whole image. You can always post a link to a larger version.
I get the "I want you to see it large" ... but that prevents me from seeing it in its entirety, so it loses context when I'm viewing the bottom half or viewing the top half ... so I have to zoom out my screen to make it smaller to view anyway.
I"m curious @ the silhouette aspect of the tree & treeline vs. the grass. It is a bit confusing to me as I look at part of it and think "daytime" and other areas and think "nighttime". I'm not sure if that is by artistic intent, or incidental.
It obviously is in the realm of artistic liberty ... just not sure what you were striving for ... which makes it tough to know how to respond. Maybe you could share your vision for the piece with a bit more explanation.
When I see a shot like this, I always want to know how it was taken. Iso, aperture, lens, shutter speed etc. Since this is technically difficult, it helps to know those things other than to present it as a mystery.
We are near full moon, so perhaps it was moonlit. The grass suggests that, so why not the trees. The short star trails suggest a fast shutter, like 1/15 or 1/30 depending on focal length. The noise is well controlled, better than I can get with my Canon gear. The grass is sharp, as well as the stars so you had deep DOF, suggesting a WA lens. No corner softness or vignetting which suggests a very sharp lens or a crop. If I had to guess I would say Ziess 21 on some Nikon.
Other than lack of light on the trees, I like it a lot, probably like it even better in color.
Thanks for the comments guys, its always incredibly helpful to see how other photographers see an image.
I should have posted EXIF etc to start with, the shot was made by bright moonlight with a Canon 5D2 with Canon 24L Mk2 F1.4 @ f2.8 for 8 seconds at ISO 1600 RAW, uncropped image processed in ACR. The lens was focussed manually with live view on the stars for absolute infinity.
I understand the comments about the darkness of the tree compared to the lightness of the foreground, rightly or wrongly I was trying to reproduce the tonality I saw in the scene for what its worth. Doesn't mean I got it right though! Definitely something for me to think about here, so thanks.
You can get away with large - to about 1024 on the horizontal axis. However, please limit the vertical axis the 800 or at most 900 pixels. Otherwise too many folks have to scroll the image to view and that effectively reduces the over-all impression of the image.
I'd suggest mining more detail from the tree, perhaps with the Shadow/highlights adjustment in PS and darkening the foreground to avoid drawing the eye to the bottom of the image.
