Critique Wanted Whats wrong with this?

Hmm, yeah... the problem for me was cutting off the tops of the tower thingies on the left. As it was, I cut one off with the photograph anyway.. I suppose I could crop to just above the tree, but I must confess I am not that keen to do so.

As a matter of curiosity... why? I mean, why don't you like centred horizons? I know the rule of thirds says don't do it, but I think rules are made to be broken, or at least bent somewhat... and sometimes taking them off-centre makes a photograph look silly. (I am not, btw, saying I always centre them, but I often make a decision to do so in spite of what "the rule" says, and that was the case, IIRC, with this one, because of the other "stuff" in the shot)
 
a few useless comments from me!

the horizon is not quite straight - once it is the verticals will look more "vertical"

add a bit of "fill light" and it may reflect the red sky better - especially if you play around with saturation and maybe vibrance

use the develop tools in LR
 
Comments are never useless, Bill. Straight horizons I can relate to. I'll see to it. I almost always have "issues". I must see things crooked! I thank god for the levels in my K-5 and X100.

Tried to add some fill light (via levels, this was never a RAW file) but there's just not enough information inside the shadow areas to allow more light. This is as good as it gets. The original was even darker.
 
we are not supposed to do this - but I will for 10 mins
then you can tell me if you prefer the original or not

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If you play around with it - it could be the sun going down or the opposite!!

which is it - I suppose I could figure it out from your Flickr .... Harbour Sunset!
 
Sue, you are right that rules are made to be broken. But to keep the unsightly tower in the frame should not be a reason to do so. Even the could line is telling you it's OK to crop out a hunk of sky. And Bill has a keen eye...I hadn't noticed, but a very slight tilt to the horizon.
 
Sue

I agree with Luke - I don't like those tower things on the left! ..... but they could grow on me ....... in fact they don't look too bad now they have gone ..... maybe bring them back ......no they have got to go

I crop a lot - but I always try to keep to original ratios - i.e 5 x 4 - 16 x 9 - square etc. etc....... and I mostly feel that if the crop doesn't work at an "original" ratio ..... the image looks "funny" - so I always use "original" crop in LR well before custom

but if you were shooting with a Rangefinder you would not be allowed to crop, or you would be reported to the "powers that be"
 
Sue, that's night and day better to my eyes. Those towers add nothing (just like in real life). And I don't mind the horizon centered so much now that the waterway has a left to right flow instead of that being centered as well.
 
Of course, you two were posting at the same time as I was cropping etc.... thats life. I take your points, as you see from my efforts as well.

Bill, your increased vibrance works well, and that's exactly how mine looks on the laptop. I have no idea why it does not translate to the screen. I can only think that in fact yours is even brighter than I am actually seeing it, because mine looks washed out, compared to what it looks like here. This, no doubt, is down to the fact that right now I am not using that external screen I bought for just this reason... editing photographs. Oops.

I'm going to recalibrate my MBP screen and see if it makes a difference. But... surely it should not, between here, in iphoto and PS, to there, on the web... seems insane to me.

[edit] after a recalibration of the screen (I still had it set on the printer profile. argh) I can see how much brighter yours and Lukes are, Bill, than mine.
 
Sue

Spyder Pro is supposed to be the best calibration software, (it has a bit of hardware with it) - another up to £100 to spend

Edit - Sue, just been reading about (mac), monitor calibration - as usual it seems a maze depending on the author of the article

(apparently, most Mac monitors are too bright!)
 
Sue

Spyder Pro is supposed to be the best calibration software, (it has a bit of hardware with it) - another up to £100 to spend

Edit - Sue, just been reading about (mac), monitor calibration - as usual it seems a maze depending on the author of the article

(apparently, most Mac monitors are too bright!)

They are. I usually set mine to something "less". On the Dell screen, its easy. On the MBP, the nuances are not so easy to see. A Spyder... yes. But no. The financial challenges of my life preclude any such thoughts at the moment. I can borrow one from camera club, once my car is repaired and I can get back there.
 
The crop looks much, much better Sue! All of a sudden, there's some tension in the image and the eyes follow the pier from the lower right to the bit of land on the left, and then follow the water / horizon to the right again. The original was a bit direction-less...
 
A couple of attempts

I rather liked the original. Nevertheless, I fiddled the cropping to try to do something with the rule of thirds. Then I messed with the exposure, saturation, and color temperature to see if anything interesting would happen with the sky. I'm not convinced that either attempt is a real improvement. I did, however, manage to wipe out the detail in most of the dark areas!

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Cheers, Jock
 
Hi Sue, the pic you put up originally is a bit dark and washed out, also I'm seeing it almost pixelated or maybe just soft. It doesn't have the sort of sharpness that would give it a bit of zing anyway, although that might just be the resolution it's posted at. Yeah, the half tower is a bit odd, I might have tried to take it just R of the towers so you still get that nice tree in. I might have a play with it if I get time although I'm not sure I can do much good, my processing is decidedly "footer about and try not to cock it up".
 
This is a few minutes of Snapseed, I looked at various filters and textures and stuff but it isn't really suited to that. So - upped the saturation, warmth and ambience (whatever that is), cropped from both R and L maintaining original ratio, then put a wee tilt-shift on it for a bit of something different. I now don't like the fact that the last post of the pier looks like a finger pointing at the cranes, but there you go.
 
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