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Alex de Groot Offline • Upload & Sell: Off p.1 #1 · My 2012 favorites, first time posting my photo's First time I'm posting images here on FM, have been a reader on the forum for quite some time now, but never really posted myself, so here are some pictures I like to share with you. Hope you like, and critique welcome All with my canon 550d / rebel t2i IMG_7544 by Alex de Groot, on Flickr IMG_6953 by Alex de Groot, on Flickr IMG_4468 by Alex de Groot, on Flickr IMG_4087 by Alex de Groot, on Flickr B_IMG_0457 by Alex de Groot, on Flickr Jan 09, 2013 at 12:35 PM

RustyBug Offline • • • • • Upload & Sell: On p.1 #2 · My 2012 favorites, first time posting my photo's Welcome to the Forum. A nice set that clearly illustrates your fondness and usage of lines (I dig that). No time to discuss individually, but collectively I can see your appeal to them. Jan 09, 2013 at 02:31 PM

sbeme Offline • • • • • • Upload & Sell: On p.1 #3 · My 2012 favorites, first time posting my photo's Alex, First welcome Second, some fine images. Generally you will get more feedback if you post 1-3 images, linked by a common question, some variation, etc. Here is my feedback. 1. Nice symmetry play with fine color, sharpness. I might clone out the brightest star on the left, since its all about the lines and symmetry and the star is a slight distraction. 2. Its a nice scene. The sky is gorgeous. The sharpness of the silhouettes is excellent. Some might suggest a tighter crop, less sky, but I like the personal connection out in the open, under the big sky. 3. Hard to do anything new or different with the Eiffel Tower but you chose a dynamic angle with, again, excellent processing. 4. Love the colors. Love the DOF. Not sure I can accept the blown out/near blown out sky. Just a bit too big, too much, too dominant. 5. Certainly sharing your range. I like the BW processing very much. Nicely done. POV is strong but I feel like there is an unusual implied message. The path alongside the train appears more the subject, more powerfully pulls the eye than the train itself. More typically I would expect a POV emphasizing how the train moves in the distance. As is, image works, with nice geometries, use of triangles, leading lines. Scott Jan 10, 2013 at 12:36 AM

Bob Jarman Offline • • • • Upload & Sell: On p.1 #4 · My 2012 favorites, first time posting my photo's Welcome Alex, Love the lines, especially #5, which I think Scott's comments cover well. One suggestion, perhaps remove the light tower at left and explore a crop with the tarmac originating at the apex of the lower right hand corner rather than just to the left. Great toning! Regards, Bob Jan 10, 2013 at 01:03 AM

Alex de Groot Offline • Upload & Sell: Off p.1 #5 · My 2012 favorites, first time posting my photo's It's been a little while ago you commented, but thanks for your kind words Sbeme thank you for you feedback ! Jan 23, 2013 at 11:36 AM

dmacmillan Offline • • • • Upload & Sell: Off p.1 #6 · My 2012 favorites, first time posting my photo's Nice range of images showing effective use of different focal lengths. They have a strong graphic quality and your post processing is very good. Very nice work! Jan 23, 2013 at 02:43 PM

cgardner Offline • • • • • Upload & Sell: Off p.1 #7 · My 2012 favorites, first time posting my photo's Very nicely executed thoughtfully composed shots. #1 good use of symmetry here. I find the space on top pulls attention up and away from the "payoff" here, the tower in the background framed by the foreground near the bottom. Crop the sky just above the foreground tower to remove that distraction and get better top>down eye movement. #2 Off center / right small focal point grabs the eye first and tells the entire story of father / daughter outing in the park (via context of the bench). The viewer then will get pulled off that "Aw how sweet!" focal point into "dead" space. Yes the space conveys openness, but is that context really critical to the story here or a distraction from it? My "rule of thumb" is that if something in a composition pulls the eye away from the focal point and there isn't something equally interesting when it gets there (i.e., multiple centers of interest) it's a distraction that will dilute the story. What I do when shooting / critiquing a shot like this is pull in tight as a close-up of the action and then expand the crop outward while asking what the background context adds to the story. This would work great as-is for the first "establishing" shot of a series for showing the the faces, but as a standalone shot it works better for me cropped tighter. #3 Compare your framing choice (relative size of focal point to frame) here with your choice in #2 with more "negative" space. One of the reasons this shot has great impact is that the background context doesn't pull attention off the focal point as in #2. Goes to what I said in #2 about a tighter crop creating more impact. Also what I like here is that whether you start on the top and scan down (as reading a page) or start on the bottom and scan up (as viewing in person) it's equally interesting because the shape changes. #4 What helps make this shot work is what I call "unifying centers of interest". In many shots like this you'll see sun and focal point in the foreground on opposite sides or widely spaces creating a competing ping-pong eye movement. Moving your POV to put the sun behind the grain unifies the two focal points into one. That and the choice of the vertical crop attracts my eye via contrast to the sun and then it travels down the grain, into grass in the foreground, back into the trees then the contrast of the sun brings me back to the main focal point. Combined it creates a very harmonious circluar eye movement vs. the ping-pong linear one created by widely separated focal points. #5 Here the leading line created by the perspective and the foreground on the left works to pull attention from the most interesting detail to less interesting detail. What happens when you get to the horizon is you follow the same line back to see the focal point again. Linear eye-path shots work best for me when my eyes get pulled over the less interesting content first then arrive and stay on the most interesting focal point, or as in #4 my eyes see the main focal point(s) first, get pulled off, but return again ON A DIFFERENT PATH I haven't already seen. As an experiment only try flipping it 180 degrees so front of car is on right side. That's more likely to "read" context > focal point for someone accustomed to reading left > right. If you also darken the side of the train and sky so the end of the foreground car has stronger contrast with both it will be a stronger perceptual focal point. Back in the days of shooting B&W film we'd use a red filter to darken the sky to create more contrast between it and a lighter object. The dark skies in Adams' iconic shots were created that way. With digital the short range requires blowing out the sky to record "normal" detail in the mid-tones. Using a polarizing filter will help darken skies. Another solution at capture to overcome the long range scene and short range sensor is a graduated ND filter to darken the sky, but they work best on a shot where there is a well defined horizon (like a ocean view). Masked blended exposures one for dark sky, the other for normal tonal range on foreground would be the best (albeit not the easiest) solution to make the end of the train contrast vs. getting lost in the similar tone of the sky. A very solid set. Thanks for sharing. Jan 23, 2013 at 03:20 PM

Alex de Groot Offline • Upload & Sell: Off p.1 #8 · My 2012 favorites, first time posting my photo's cgardner thank you for your excellent and informative commentary on my photo's, I really appreciate it! Jan 24, 2013 at 07:22 PM

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