And a river runs through it... Photo

Photographer’s Note

The river being the Skirfare.
Image taken near Hawkswick (Yorkshire dales).
Further information can be found here.
http://www.guidebook.free-online.co.uk/wharfegrassington.htm

PP

Levels, USM.
The PP was conducted to alter the exposure (selected sky darkened a little, inverted selection then lightened the landscape) the rest is down to mother nature :)

UPDATE:

Taking on board aella's comments I thought I would do a workshop to try and focus in on a point of interest - obviously I am starting to loose out on definition - but is this the shot I should have taken? (please see my workshop).

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Critiques | Translate

Pompey (1117) 2004-10-08 15:09

Excellent image of a beautiful part of England. Something to look at wherever your eye wanders.
Well spotted Stephen!

aella (117) 2004-10-08 15:12

This photo looks really surreal - post-processing is pretty obvious, but I don't mind it end look as long as it was deliberate. It has a candy-world feel to it; you'd kind of expect Oompa Loumpas to appear in a corner.

It's missing a focus point though. The eye follows the river to... not much. I fonder what the picture would look like a bit closer to the bridge.

Still, an interesting picture.

burdallet (0) 2004-10-08 15:12

Meadow walled of stones ( like Eire-land/Scotland ) .. land for sheep extensive cattling ?

Hanssie (9133) 2004-10-08 16:29

Great colours and light (again) and what I also like in this shot, is the stone wall here in the front, very nice done !

robiuk (10763) 2004-10-09 20:16

Oh no, I wouldn't go for cropping out the stone wall as it's too important to be missed out.
Though I can see Catherine's point but in that case I would come closer to the bridge and focus on it - which is another cattle of fish...

pamastro (7213) 2004-10-10 0:49

The lines of the walls follow the lines of the river perfectly. Excellent color and contrast once again. I liked bringing up the bottom in the workshop but the stone wall is a nice part here in the foreground to give an added sense of space. The lighting here is excellently controlled. It matches the rolling landscape. And the sky is just perfect for it all. To me I think the focal point is the path through the center of the shot that curves around to the distant landscape. Nicely worked and photographed.

cgrindahl (6109) 2004-10-13 3:35

I believe you improved the photo considerably in your workshop Stephen. The wall and bush at the right side really don't add much to the composition, while cropping them brings us closer, making the diagonal of the creek running toward the bridge a central element.

You make no mention of increasing saturation but the colors seem a bit too intense to my eye, but then it has been many years since I last visited England. Perhaps I've been looking at the dried out landscape of California for too long... ;-)

I applaud your experimentation in post processing nonetheless. Your images have much more life to them. That leaves the question about composition and how best to utilize the elements in the scene to create the best sense of place. I'm hardly the person to offer pointers on such things, but there is always benefit in looking at how others are framing images. I believe I've seen your critiques of images by David Sidwell. He has a wonderful eye for composition. To my mind simple is always better than complex and it is helpful if we give the viewer's eye a path toward a focal point, as Catherine suggests. Keep shooting and playing with images as you keep looking at what other's are doing. This is how we all learn to be better at this wonderful craft.