7 new shots in portfolio - please critique

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

12/03/2004 01:33:34 AM · #1

Here are some shots I've been meaning to upload for a little while:

Please let me know what you think of them. Be honest, I can take it. But, click through first... the thumbnails don't do the larger images justice. :^)

Thanks,
Ara

artvet

Canon EOS-6D

12/03/2004 02:45:28 AM · #2

I like the most #2,3 & 4.
Six Vases: it seems to be soft, but makes it pleasant to watch, what about deeper depth of field ?
300CPW1: nice panoramic view with very interesting sky!
Lamp Details: good composition, kind of intriguing.
How much processing and what ISO did you use for the landscape photos?

train

Panasonic DMC-FZ30

12/03/2004 03:07:57 AM · #3

I have left comments on all of them

HRoxas

Canon EOS-5D

Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM

12/03/2004 03:14:41 AM · #4

Love all the Central Park photos, they're gorgeous!

The Six Vases still life I quite like a lot, but I'd like to see it with more saturated colors and a boost in contrast. If you we're going for a more muted color and soft effect, you've done a great job. Nice work all in all.

12/03/2004 09:01:16 AM · #5

Originally posted by artvet:

Thanks for the comments! The vases are soft and grainy b/c I had almost no light, had to shoot wide open with a high iso (800 or 1600, i don't remember offhand) The lamp is even grainier b/c there was less light, and i remember shooting that at 1600 iso. I think all the landscape shots were at 100, but since i was shooting directly into a sunset, all the dark areas were very underexposed and have a lot of noise in them. The major post-processing was levels to get the histogram spread out and heavy shadow/highlight to boost the darks cut the highlights. you can see the halos from shadow/highlight in almost all the shots.

12/03/2004 09:05:27 AM · #6

Originally posted by train:

I have left comments on all of them

Thanks, it was great to see all these new comments when I logged on. I'll have to read them more carefully when I have time to sit and peruse them.

12/03/2004 09:11:59 AM · #7

Originally posted by bruchen:

Thanks. I'll see if I can find the original - i think i cut the saturation from it. The room (same one with the lamp in it) is full of different, delicate and muted colors - it was hard to get the shots to look natural because of the terrible light (no tripod with me that day) and the soft colors played havoc with white balance (i think i shot jpg there. since then i've pretty much committed to RAW all the time.)

12/03/2004 12:16:12 PM · #8

Ok, so with 4 comments on the Frozen Leaf photo telling me to fix it up, I spent some time with it.

First I cloned out the snow/frost blobs. Then created levels and curves adjustment layers each with blending set to luminosity (just read about that in another thread here.) Then a local contrast USM with settings something like 40%, 40, 0 followed by a normal sharpening USM. Added a touch of shadow/highligh to cut some of the highlights, tried my best to crop it boldly, resized with bicubic softer and applied final sharpening.

What do you think?

12/03/2004 08:24:42 PM · #9

bump for the night crowd

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

12/04/2004 06:42:04 PM · #10

Originally posted by BikeRacer:

Just got a comment on this one from ridvanerkan asking how the capture was made. It's a leaf frozen in the ice on a frozen lake. I guess the bubbles are dissolved gasses trapped in the layers of ice. Using some fresh and abandoned ice fishing holes as a gauge, the ice was over 12" thick. My friend and I were walking around on the ice and he noticed the leaf. I tried to make the shot look as good as the original, but my skill, and my sony cybershot, weren't really up to the task.

samtrundle

Canon EOS-50D

12/04/2004 07:56:44 PM · #11

I think you have definately improved it. It's hard to tell exactly how well it works - I really like the subject, but in the resized version it appears almost slightly out of focus, I'd like to see the original, Im sure having everything on a larger scale makes this picture really effective.

glass_slippers

Nikon Coolpix 3200

12/04/2004 08:15:03 PM · #12

Hi Bikeracer....First let me commend you for putting your "neck: out to get it lopped off by someone like me. ...only kidding..
Seriously..the frozen leaf picture is totally awesome..nothing more should be done to it in my opinion.
The rest of the shots need to go back to the drawing board I am afraid to say. The black and white cityscape lacks any exterem values. Simply meaning that it is to greyish..not enough highlights..not enough dark tones..The other shots of the city scapes are good compositions and are very nice..but they lack a few important things..Number 1 is lighting of the buildings..far to drab and lifeless and the number 2 problem you are having is the perspective..it is far to flat looking. Nex time set your camera to a aperture that allows for longer exposures and use a tripod to keep the image from bluring..that will lighten things up quite a bit on a dark and stormy day and give you a lot more contrast as well.
I am not such a hot shot photographer myself..but I am an aritst with a lot of art history under my belt.
But take what I say positive Ok..
I asked Doanld Trump one day..."To what do you owe your success to?" His answer was..."experience"..Then I asked him how do you make good decisions? His answer was "experience" ..Then I asked him "how do you get this experience?" His answer was.."By making good decisions.",,Ahhh I understand..I said to myself..When I asked him how he learned to make good decisions to get the experience...His answer was..."by making bad decisions.",,,ya gotta learn from mistakes in life..I am trying with my camera now too..go look at some of my pathetic pictures.
In addition to the above..If you were to simply flip the six vases over..it would be a much more dramatic composition..the way it stand now..I am searching..The ceiling fan? shot..don't like it at all..it made me dizzy!

Message edited by author 2004-12-04 20:16:42.

12/05/2004 02:15:57 AM · #13

Originally posted by samtrundle:

Thanks. I think the main culprit there is that I'm being a total cheapskate with my pics. With only 1 or 2 exceptions, all my non-challenge shots are saved at 50K or less -- as it is, my portfolio is already 38% full. The first version of Frozen Leaf above is really close to the original, with only some levels and USM applied I think.