South Stack - A little different

TGphoto

TGphoto

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Tom
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Hi all,

I visited South Stack the other night hoping for an amazing sunset. There were some nice colours but in the wrong direction, behind the lighthouse was mostly clouds. I decided to try a new editing style on this one and purposely blew out the sky to put the focus on the foreground. This is completely different to what I would normally do but I have seen this style before and I do like it.

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts... I know this won't be to everyones tastes.

South Stack by Thomas Green, on Flickr

EDIT:

Another image added, I found one with a half ok sky.

South Stack by Thomas Green, on Flickr

and a crop..

[url=https://flic.kr/p/MtQGKY]South Stack Crop by Thomas Green, on Flickr[/URL]

Thanks,

Tom
 
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I like it, but I'd try to really pull back the highlights a bit to see what it looked like.. Not sure if this is because I think it almost looks foggy with the big white band and thus I want to see fog = drop the whites, or whether all the whites are competing with the building (which is also white) If the latter, I'd look to leave the building white-as-is but reign in the sky highlights back to grey-ish.

On a totally personal note, I'd see what it looked like flipped because that R -> L leading line looks less comfortable than if it was leading L -> R. Very much a 'me' thing though.

The foreground is not prominent for me (by design?) - it's more that huge slab of rock to the right which is mostly in shadow. Not sure that lifting this would improve the image though as I like the moody feel it adds.
Sorry - this is all a bit rambling. It's a really nice image, hence me spending time thinking about it. If it were boring I wouldn't comment :)
 
its not just the sky thats blown but the sea as well
should have tried bracketing that normally helps
 
Harlequin565 said:
I like it, but I'd try to really pull back the highlights a bit to see what it looked like.. Not sure if this is because I think it almost looks foggy with the big white band and thus I want to see fog = drop the whites, or whether all the whites are competing with the building (which is also white) If the latter, I'd look to leave the building white-as-is but reign in the sky highlights back to grey-ish.

On a totally personal note, I'd see what it looked like flipped because that R -> L leading line looks less comfortable than if it was leading L -> R. Very much a 'me' thing though.

The foreground is not prominent for me (by design?) - it's more that huge slab of rock to the right which is mostly in shadow. Not sure that lifting this would improve the image though as I like the moody feel it adds.
Sorry - this is all a bit rambling. It's a really nice image, hence me spending time thinking about it. If it were boring I wouldn't comment :)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the comments - will have a look at that. I did add a bit of graduated fog in as well using Colour Efex.

Thanks again!

holty said:
its not just the sky thats blown but the sea as well
should have tried bracketing that normally helps
Click to expand...

I did bracket, and do regularly - if you read the description - didn't like the sunset so I PURPOSELY blew out the image, the sea and the sky is fully intentional.
 
Interesting idea to let the sky and some of the sea go 'over' and it works in terms of composition. One thought - would it be enhanced if the sea were smoothed with a long exposure? That would enhance the feel of a deliberately managed image. You might get an approximation by dropping the contrast on just the sea. I guess I'm partly saying, take the experiment a bit further!
 
Doesn't work for me either, better to try for the sunset another time :)
 
JohnFar said:
Interesting idea to let the sky and some of the sea go 'over' and it works in terms of composition. One thought - would it be enhanced if the sea were smoothed with a long exposure? That would enhance the feel of a deliberately managed image. You might get an approximation by dropping the contrast on just the sea. I guess I'm partly saying, take the experiment a bit further!
Click to expand...

I did actually do some LE's and realised when I had got home that there had somehow been some light leakage, was pretty gutted!

gramps said:
Doesn't work for me either, better to try for the sunset another time :)
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No worries, cheers.

nickjohnwatson said:
Not for me I’m afraid
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Constructive criticism is helpful - 'not for me', isn't.

LongLensPhotography said:
epic fail I'm afraid. The "new editing style" could be easily achieved by shooting on a 6 year old iphone without any effort. Sorry.
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Uncalled for, rude and I disagree. Not that I am emulating them but there are several on instagram that have thousands and thousands of followers that use this style with every image.

Went for something out of the box here as personally, I don't care too much for the traditional 'rules'.
 
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Tom Green said:
I did actually do some LE's and realised when I had got home that there had somehow been some light leakage, was pretty gutted!



No worries, cheers.



Constructive criticism is helpful - 'not for me', isn't.



Uncalled for, rude and I disagree. Not that I am emulating them but there are several on instagram that have thousands and thousands of followers that use this style with every image.

Went for something out of the box here as personally, I don't care too much for the traditional 'rules'.
Click to expand...

You asked for my thoughts so there you have it, and there is nothing rude in it all. I don't have to pretend that I like it if I clearly don't. It just looks like 100% iphone snap anyone would get without any effort and I couldn't care if some platform is full of that stuff or the likes they get. If you like it and don't like honest critique then please kindly consider uploading this experimental content to the said site and everyone will be very happy.
 
LongLensPhotography said:
You asked for my thoughts so there you have it, and there is nothing rude in it all. I don't have to pretend that I like it if I clearly don't. It just looks like 100% iphone snap anyone would get without any effort and I couldn't care if some platform is full of that stuff or the likes they get. If you like it and don't like honest critique then please kindly consider uploading this experimental content to the said site and everyone will be very happy.
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Right....but this is about constructive criticism and there was nothing constructive about your comment at all. I’d like to see you recreate it with an iPhone, that would be great :)
 
Tom Green said:
Right....but this is about constructive criticism and there was nothing constructive about your comment at all. I’d like to see you recreate it with an iPhone, that would be great :)
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I'm afraid past a certain point there can't be many constructive things to be said. I could post a photo with both severe under and over-exposure, add camera shake and maybe a very nasty flare and ask for critique. I would deserve everything that comes my way since people can clearly see it would be magnitudes below my normal standard so potentially just a troll post.

P.S. I'm proudly iphone free:) but you are more than welcome to review image sharing sites for phone images so that you can convince yourself that even they have better dynamic range than this.

On a more constructive note, whether it was again intentional or not the lighthouse appears to be clearly falling over to one side.
 
LongLensPhotography said:
I'm afraid past a certain point there can't be many constructive things to be said. I could post a photo with both severe under and over-exposure, add camera shake and maybe a very nasty flare and ask for critique. I would deserve everything that comes my way since people can clearly see it would be magnitudes below my normal standard so potentially just a troll post.

P.S. I'm proudly iphone free:) but you are more than welcome to review image sharing sites for phone images so that you can convince yourself that even they have better dynamic range than this.

On a more constructive note, whether it was again intentional or not the lighthouse appears to be clearly falling over to one side.
Click to expand...


None of which this image has (unless purposely done so) so is a redundant comment. You think this is a troll post?

I haven't commented on your images whatsoever.

Thanks for the constructive point, now you're right there. However, with this image I had major issues with the distortion of the sea so had to compensate. Guess I shouldn't have shot at 18mm.

Anyway, probably time to get rid of of these images.
 
Tom Green said:
None of which this image has (unless purposely done so) so is a redundant comment. You think this is a troll post?
Click to expand...

Blown out sky and sea - tick
Very dark to nearly black foreground - tick. That's precisely what early digikams and phones did.
The rest - no.

To be fair it is so far below your usual that I wasn't sure what to think. I'm really not sure; it easily could be. If it was an attempt to contrasty black and white I would say yes fair enough even if it is not for me (lack of clear texture and detail being the main reason).
 
Like to composition but the perspective is of slightly, the lighthouse doesn't lean that much.
 
Always worth trying something different but to be honest it doesn't work for me. The problem with blowing the sky and some of the water is that this also affects the lighthouse which is really the main subject.. it therefore gets lost. I'm sure this technique works in certain scenarios just not with a white lighthouse.

Simon
 
No reply to my question of where is South Stack? I am sure it is not in Manchester where the OP comes from
 
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Thank you, it always help is saying where it actually is in case someone else wants to visit it
 
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