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Loukie Viljoen
06-20-2008, 01:09 PM
This one of the mornings no matter where you point your camera there is a shot. Please believe me [I'm your dentist:)] I have done no PP work on this one, I have others the same I am hesitant to put it up it looks so surreal.
File size: 689KB
Camera Model: Canon EOS-1D Mark II
Shutter speed: 1/60 sec
Aperture: 14
Exposure mode: Av
Exposure compensation: -1 1/3
Flash: Off
Metering mode: Multi-segment
ISO: 125
Focal length: 85mm
Image size: 1728 x 1152

Bruce Murden
06-20-2008, 02:48 PM
That day was a lovely gift for you! I particularly like the upper half of the image, since the lines of the dunes and the shadows keep bringing your eye back into the picture. The foreground dune and shadow, though, tend to take my eye out of the bottom of the frame. I can't see a crop from the bottom that makes much of a difference, since the shadow keeps pulling me down and out of the picture. It makes me wonder if the dune stopped just outside the frame, which would keep they eye moving along its lines. Do you recall what was there?

Roman Kurywczak
06-20-2008, 04:02 PM
Hi Loukie,
I have wanted to get to this place for a long time..............The lighting is very dramatic. While I agree with Bruce that the shadow does tend to pull the eye out of the frame..........I felt a slight crop off the bottom....where there is a lighter sand area would still help compositionally overall. Let me know what you think of the cropped version if you feel it strenghtens it a bit compositionally. Would love to see more of these as these images are some of my favorites to look at. Nicely done minimizing the sky also.

Brian Wong
06-20-2008, 04:17 PM
Hi Loukie!

I'm not a landscape guy but I think Roman's version is stronger. My thinking is to simplify ... I love the dramatic curves, lines, deep shadows and strong red/orange color of the image ... but all the smaller details, ripples, tiny rocks, and colors other than red, orange, black seems to detract for me. I am curious about not even sharpening all those areas, or even smoothing them with some blur, or even more drastic cleaning them up with PS, and making it an abstract ... and see if that feels even stronger?? Looks like a very interesting place!

Arthur Morris
06-21-2008, 02:18 PM
I am not a landscape guy either. I love the image as posted and Roman's re-post w crop is an improvement. I think that more of a pano crop actually works pretty well too. Why? It eliminates most of the lower right corner which was something of a drag on the ORIG.

BTW Loukie, you finally have a winner! Way to go.

Robert Amoruso
06-22-2008, 08:37 AM
I would settle with Artie's final crop here. It strengthens the FG and lessens the tendency of that one dark shadow from leading you out of the image.

Shadows add great drama to this image and the pano works to strength that by eliminating the less dramatic FG.

Kaushik Balakumar
06-27-2008, 07:08 AM
Another vote for Arthur's crop. That apart, I feel that the image is bit too saturated.