Snow Cattails Willows and Cottonwoods

[David Stephens]

139614

Taken during a short, heavy snow while out looking for wildlife.

Canon 7D, EF 70-200mm f/4L IS at 70mm, Av Mode, ISO 800, +2/3EV, f/11, resulting in 1/320-sec., hand held, with Raw conversion in DxO Optics Pro 9.1

[Grady Weed]

I have to admit, at first I was not sure how to handle this image. I really like the contrasted colors, on the bottom, the cattails, versus the leafless trees. The snow added some interest but the 2 blurred snow flakes draws my eye away. Since I love B&W's I thought a conversion would help diminish the minor distractions noted. I cropped up from the bottom, then converted to B&W. I adjusted the mid-tones, a slight shadows and highlights and mild curves adjustment. I would love to see one from further away, more of the trees, in a B&W. :) Do you have more? What do you think of the conversion? Thanks for posting.

[Arthur Morris]

Nice job by Grady. The crop off the bottom was mandatory as the 3 large o-o-f reeds were image killers. I like the look of the smaller snowflakes. And I like the pattern of the tree branches. An image without the reeds might have worked well.

All that said Grady was right when he said that the few large o-o-f snowflakes were problematic here.

The overall lesson here: out-of-focus stuff be it snowflakes or reeds that are in front of the point of focus are almost always so distracting as to ruin an image.

I recently had to deal with similar problems in Japan.

[Andrew McLachlan]

Hi David, ditto on Grady and Arthur's comments. I am assuming since this was a handheld capture perhaps you did not have your tripod with you. If you did have it with you a tripod mounted camera with slightly longer exposure may have captured the movement of falling snowflakes, creating a slightly more pleasing look. O do like the colors of the OP as well as Grady's B&W repost. Have you thought about using quick masks to remove the larger out-of-focus flakes? I'd be interested in seeing any other variations that you may have on this scene as I think you were on the right path, just did not nail it with this image...but maybe in another?

[Diane Miller]

I'm late here but have to say I really love this image! There is so much interest in the trees, I wish to see more of them, vertically. But maybe a good reason more wasn't included. I do like cropping a little off the bottom in the composition presented in the OP -- there is a sameness in the bottom compared to the variations to be explored in the trees, for me anyway.

If you have other compositions of this scene, I'd love to see them!

[David Stephens]

Thanks for the sincere, helpful suggestions. I actually thought the OOF snow was a positive, but I see what you mean. I'll try to rework it this weekend, taking into account your ideas.

[David Stephens]

Oops, duplicate post.

[Don Railton]

Hi Dave

You got good suggestions above. I liked the layers in the OP and the B&W RP by Grad lifts it further IMHO. Never seen snow falling like this..

DON