That's an amazing frame! Really beautiful atmosphere and light. Most excellent.
Your treatment is interesting, leaving a sliver of bright high contrast sky along the horizon. It generates a good effect of something ominous or threatening. It also gives you a focal point in the frame, and a place for your eye to wander to.
This is a very impressive shot, with a very menacing sky. To be picky I should point out that there is a white spot in the landscape near the right hand side which catches my eye and I feel you should have spotted it out.
This is a very impressive shot, with a very menacing sky. To be picky I should point out that there is a white spot in the landscape near the right hand side which catches my eye and I feel you should have spotted it out.
That's an amazing frame! Really beautiful atmosphere and light. Most excellent.
Your treatment is interesting, leaving a sliver of bright high contrast sky along the horizon. It generates a good effect of something ominous or threatening. It also gives you a focal point in the frame, and a place for your eye to wander to.
No, I don't necessarily think that would be advantageous, because it would steal too much attention in my opinion. The way I see the picture my eye wanders down the road, observing the landscape around it, but there is a destination and it's in the hills far on the horizon with that beautiful bright sky.
You could possibly play with more contrast in the sky, and burning in of the lower left and lower right corner, to further emphasize the sense of direction in the print, to further assist the eye down the road. Consider also making the sky more top heavy, by burning in the top edge gradually from about two thirds of the sky and up. I feel that the blacks might be a little bit weak and needing a bit more impact, perhaps. There are all fine tuning advice that I think would make the print better. You are obviously free to disagree.
Since you asked for some feedback, I figured I might as well go the full distance.
The abrupt transition in sky from bright highlight close to the ground to dark looks unnatural to me. I would have preferred more gradual and wider transition zone, then not go so dark evenly across the top. I tend to agree path is sort of burried in the image. A little lighter may better define it - that is assuming the path is one of the main "actors" in this image.
An amazing sky, you were in the right place at the right time. Reminds me of South Park in Colorado, or the eastern part of Washington. When I look at this from a technique perspective, I think that it is very close to what I think of as a the nearly ideal exercise of the zone system. Were you thinking zone system whith the original exposure? And I'm curious how much of this image results from the negative, and how much from printing. I really like this image, and if you experiment with another version, please upload it as well.
Thank you all for the comments. In terms of visualization of the scene before pressing the shutter what I wanted to capture was the dramatic white edge as the clouds rolled in, the road became my vehicle, so I though to lead one in to the picture. During printing I did burn in the sky. The entire edge from the ridge upward received 90 seconds additional exposure. Thomas, yes I think I'll play around with the contrast to add more drama. I'll post my second attempt later in the week.
I think there's a lot of potential with this shot, but some things I found off-putting was the powerful white horizon kept drawing my eye in there and not up the road and towards the hills. The contrast in the sky is weak in comparison to the rest of the print and the road has too many conflicting tones with it's surroundings to make it the "subject" or have my eyes wander and and through it.
My own opinion would be to not burn the top down so much, but burn a little with more contrast to bring out the texture of the clouds. I would also burn the highlights in the horizon in a bit more as it's just too powerful and my eyes just run the horizon and fall out of the frame. The horizon also looks a little fake and over-processed. I can see where the burning went into the print and it does not look like the clouds are rolling in, which is what you state you were going for. I would also bleach the road and the hills a bit to allow it to pop out from the rest of the surrounding scene. It's really just my interpretation and opinion, but you asked. It's a great shot, but I feel it has more potential.
I admire Thomas as a photographer and printer, but I would have to disagree with the burning of the bottom left, I'd burn the bottom right side in about 7% or so in slowly with the direction of the wind and road.
Thank you, for these constructive comments, Jordan. I'll be printing again later in the week and will work through your suggestions. I too feel there is potential in the picture and am grateful for the comments to guide my own learning process. I'll post the revisions once they have been printed.