First Attempts at Shooting the Sunset

Good work getting out early. Looks like excellent conditions with the mist coming in.

You're getting quite a bit of lens flare, especially with the first. This is typical of a zoom lens with multiple elements for the light to ping off. The second shot is better, being a prime with fewer lens elements. Unfortunately it gets very expensive to get rid of flare so best not to worry about it too much - just make sure the front element is as clean as possible when shooting into the sun.

It looks like you had a wider aperture on the second so the "sun star" is less well defined.

Lastly - I'd be tempted to cut off the plane contrail in the first.

Keep it going - get out early again and lets see more.
 
The first is suffering because of the lens flare/reflections and the second could do with a bit more colour and contrast, especially in the sky.
If you're using a filter please remove it, since they can often cause this sort of flare.

I'd agree with Tobers about the aircraft trail. Whilst some contrails can enhance a shot, I don't think this one is helping, in fact I think I'd consider cropping and removing 50% of the sky, from just below the contrail, and also processing the image for stronger colours.

Personally, when I'm taking a sunset, I usually wait until the sun is a lot nearer to the horizon, that way the sun is shining through more of the earth's atmosphere, which will help reduce the intensity and possibly reduce the amount of lens flare, and may also help with colours.

Although judges often exclaim "ABS!" (Another Bl**dy Sunset) I think there is something compelling about a good sunset, which attracts most 'togs.
I've been trying for years but I've never captured one that I'm entirely happy with.
Most of the time, when I see a good sunset I seem to be in the middle of a town, surrounded by buildings and with no viewpoint.
 
Honestly, I like the first one *because* of the lens flare, I'm a bit fed up of nice clean 'perfect' sunset shots and stuff like that always grabs my interest - but agreed on the contrail, that bugs me more than it has any right to. :D
 
Thanks for all the feedback. I quite liked the flare in the first picture as Fuzzdog said, but then I am very new to this!

I think the flare was exacerbated by the use of three stacked cheap ND Grads I bought and wanted to try for the first time, as well as the Sigma 18-35 not being a prime.

I've adjusted the shot as some of you have suggested, more feedback welcomed. Also I'm happy to share the RAW (link here) if you guys want to show me how post-processing *should/could* be done better. The initial shot was very underexposed for the landscape to not blow out the sky (I'm going to try bracketing next time).

DSC_0915 updated by Jack Stoddart, on Flickr

Thanks,
 
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