I gotta go with #4 - but it's a tough choice. The foreground does look a bit over saturated to me as well, and this monitor is pretty well calibrated. It's the greens on the ground specifically. But man, still what a cool capture!
Of the first pair, I think I prefer the uncropped verion. For me, the cloud formation has a more interesting definition to it that better suits the overall composition than it's cropped version.
Interestingly enough, I feel exactly the opposite about the 2nd pair.....but for exactly the same reason.
And rather than darkening the sky, I would like to see a version with the foreground 'dirt' darkened a bit. Just the dirt, not the entire fg area. I'm not sure, but I have a sense the brightness of that is drawing some attention away from the lightning.
Fred Miranda wrote:
Great colors and mood Jim!
My favorite is the last one!
Best,
Fred
Hey Fred, thanks so much for that! Yeah, it was really cool how the light was bouncing around and really lighting up the foreground even though the light source (sun) was really opposite of how it was being lit.
Steve Perry wrote:
I gotta go with #4 - but it's a tough choice. The foreground does look a bit over saturated to me as well, and this monitor is pretty well calibrated. It's the greens on the ground specifically. But man, still what a cool capture!
Thanks so much Steve. I tried to keep both shots looking the same as possible. But in the end, #3 and 4 ended up looking a bit more saturated in the greens. I desaturated it a bit, but in the end I decided to leave it that way for now, to just see how the slight color variation affected peoples thoughts.
FoTollery wrote:
Of the first pair, I think I prefer the uncropped verion. For me, the cloud formation has a more interesting definition to it that better suits the overall composition than it's cropped version.
Interestingly enough, I feel exactly the opposite about the 2nd pair.....but for exactly the same reason.
And rather than darkening the sky, I would like to see a version with the foreground 'dirt' darkened a bit. Just the dirt, not the entire fg area. I'm not sure, but I have a sense the brightness of that is drawing some attention away from the lightning.
Most excellent shots!
Thanks Fo, that is an interesting idea about darkening the dirt. Hmmm... I will have to look at that. I was playing around the originals, and actually changed up on the crops a bit, specifically getting more sky in the shot. Course getting more sky then raises the horizon up a bit too close to the center of the shot... Hmm...
ValerieUSA wrote:
Amazing! I have a lot of lightning shots at night, but cannot do it during the day. That's tough.
Hey Valerie,
I had like no lightning shots day or evening. So to have the lightning go off like that was so cool. It's kind of cool and different I think that with the timing of these, that I could get the lightning while it was still lighter out. Now I just need to get some lightning at night...
Jim, I would be going for #1. I like the comp better. I did not read through the entire post, but were you using a lightning trigger (never mind!...ugh)? Your lightning fast trigger finger! ;-) Also, maybe it is the image size, but anyway you could bring out the lightning more (ND grad in PS)?...I am heading out to Vegas for a shoot this week, and I am going to keep this area in mind. Thanks Jim!
Great stuff, Jim. I just can't decide on a favorite, I like the features on each perspective. If I were to take the easy way out, it would be to pick the last for its clarity.
