First of two edits on a new series I'm working on: Country Roads

[Chris Calohan]

Red and blue roads in rural NW Florida. Red & blue represent much less traveled roads, often in poor repair, sometimes dirt or gravel.

Old Barn, Hwy 167



Rural Baptist Church, Hwy 277

[Richowens]

Chris,

 While the barn doesn't do much for me (can't really put my finger on why),

the church is an out of the park, bases loaded home run. To me it is perfect in every way.

Rich

[Chris Calohan]

The barn is tricky as it prints nicely but shows quite contrasty. I did do an earlier version with no sharpening that looks better on the screen..weird, but true.

[k bennett]

I like them both, but agree that the church is outstanding. The barn photo looks drastically oversharpened in my monitor, but that might just be me.

[sdwilsonsct]

I like them both, but agree that the church is outstanding.

The symmetry is very satisfying: eaves, sidewalk, big stuff.

[RSL]

I like 'em both too Chris, but I agree: the church is a home run. Keep shooting this stuff.

[Doug Frost]

I also think the church is by far the most effective of the bunch. The composition is perfectly balanced among all the elements. It has a nice graphic impact, bordering on the surreal. I don't often like photos of country churches, but this works nicely for me.

[Jaffy]

I think the second barn picture is better than the first, there seems a little more mid-grey in the planks and I expect decaying wood to be softer edged.
To me the upper door make the barn seem deeper (front to back) than the lower one, possibly because the lower entrance has a bright background, so  I don't know if you can darken that slightly to give a sense of depth and make the planks stand out more? (I'm useless at PP so it might look unnatural).

[amolitor]

Does anyone else see what appears to be a halo on the left roofline of the church building? I cannot decide if it's a processing artifact or a bizarrely fortuitous arrangement of white cloud.

[Doug Frost]

Does anyone else see what appears to be a halo on the left roofline of the church building? I cannot decide if it's a processing artifact or a bizarrely fortuitous arrangement of white cloud.

Good catch. It's there. It could be a jpeg compression artifact, especially if it's an out-of-camera jpeg. But it could also be baked into the RAW file, in which case it would be much harder to get rid of.

[Chris Calohan]

It's jpeg compression. It doesn't print like that at all.

[langier]

Nicely done!

[churly]

Chris - I'm going to have to go against the flow on this one.  I guess I'll never grow up to be a PHOTOGRAPHER. 
I strongly prefer the second version of the barn to the church.  To me, the tonality of the church is a bit harsh and the near perfect symmetry leaves the image with no depth.  To be touchy-feely, the church is 'in your face' and leaves you no room to explore, the graphic elements too sparse to be entertaining.  I'll freely admit that my comments reflect totally my preferred style and not  much more.  Without being dryly academic, it is hard to critique without reflecting one's preferences. That is quite apparent in many of the critiques I've read  here.

I like your theme concept and look forward to seeing more.  Choose your own style, whatever that is.

Chuck