Colorado valley

[rgs]

This is a scene in Rocky Mountain Park with Long's Peak in the background. It's from two 6x7 Velvia scans combined in Photoshop is sort of a manual HDR (my automated attempts with this shot have proven decidedly unsuccessful). I am interested in your reactions. Thanks.

[luxborealis]

Lovely scene with a solid foreground anchor a nice diagonal in from the left and lots of depth and movement through the photograph.

I find the lack of detail in the shadows to be unfortunate. As well, the sky appears "yellowed" (as opposed to late afternoon "warm") almost like an antiqued photograph. Lastly, my eye is drawn to and rests in the centre of the image. Perhaps cropping off the right side to remove (a) the dark branch that appears to be just "there" and (b) the worn part of the rock in the foreground might improve the dynamic.

[rgs]

I've tried your crop suggestion. Those branches are the biggest problem blending the various exposures so I don't mind losing them but I kind of miss the mountains that get lost with them. I've opened the shadows somewhat but I think starting over from scratch with that in mind would be better. I have enough brackets to do that. One of my reactions to many of the HDR photos I see is that the shadows are unnaturally light. Shadow detail may also be more obvious in a print than on screen.

I agree with the comment about the yellow cast in the sky. I have not yet been able to get it out without getting other things to look funny. I'm not yet finished with this shot.

Thanks for your comments. I appreciate it.