To my eye, there's just a little too much blank, open space. (If the sky had more detail or interest, they'd be fine as-is.) I'd crop about 20% of the sky from both.
Forget that dumb 'rule.' Compose (and crop) as needed to balance the image, not to meet some mythical / arbitrary ratio.
The problem with number 1 isn't the empty sky as much as it's the shoulder of the road. A better composition would have been a horizontal shot taken from the roadway itself. For number 2, I think the road (again) would serve as a visual element leading the viewer through the image, but from this vantage point, the road isn't used as much as it might otherwise have been (maybe this was the only vantage point available, though). Also a bit of tonal contrast would also improve this shot.
Greg-that's what I was feeling but I thought I'd see what others thought. Thanks for the suggestions.
Steve- I agree with your ideas. I am fairly new to this and realize I need to do much more thinking (composing) before I click the shutter, but that' the reason I'm here is to learn from the great wealth of knowledge that is FM.
Moleman- My processing skills are very sparse...what would you suggest? Like I said to Steve, I'm here to learn!
Here's a suggestion for you. Invest in a set of Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0 filters. They're available at www.niksoftware.com (along with some other great software). They're plugins for Photoshop, and will offer you a wide range of effects that will improve your final output. I use them all the time and am proud to do so.
