Little Silver Lake (Happy Hour again)

[Rob Mckenzie]

I got up so early I could only just open my eyes for this one. I think I might have actually fallen asleep leaning on my tripod waiting for light. It was lucky I had anchored my canoe!!
This was my standard five exposure compensations. -2, -1, 0, 1, 2.
D300, 18-55 3.5-5.6 @ 18mm
Shutter Speeds ranging from - 1/320 to 1/20 all @ f 9.0
ISO 200

[Robert Amoruso]

Rob,

Nicely done. I like the touch of "hyper-realistic" look here. I have been spending a lot of time looking at different forums to see others comments on HDR images and it proves to be an interesting exercise. There is a big contingent of folks that hate any HDR that looks anything but realistic.

I won't get into the "what is realistic" debate here, but in an image like you presented here, HDR was obviously used. That said, I think your presentation is great and I like how you tone mapped it. It is a nice combination of realistic vs. "the HDR look".

I hate that term "HDR look" but see it used a lot. I hope you are catching my drift here. I like your vision in this image so don't let others tell you its wrong. This is what being creative is all about.

Compositions good and I like the placement of the deck and boats. I think this is an optical illusion but does it need a CCW rotation? The fig is a great touch as is the triangle formed by the sky reflection in the water, shoreline (both reflection and actual) and the sky.

[Harold Davis]

i looked at this one before work this morning and was WOWed then and still like it a lot now! please excuse for me not offering any constructive criticism as this is very new to me, but i didnt want not to comment at all. looks very well done to me!!

[Rob Mckenzie]

Hi Robert, Harold
Thank you very much for the comments.
I completely agree with Robert about the Hyper Realism being an issue as soon as you go into the HDR world. There is a very fine line before going one way or the other. I have now been working with HDR for about a year and have seen a lot of different treatments, both very hyper realistic and very subtle. I really think (as always) it depends on the subject. There are some early experiments with HDR that look completely ridiculous...i.e the clouds look as though they have been stuck onto the picture or the foreground looks like a shot of a different scene than the background.
I hope the hyper realism that I have gone for here doesn't go that far. I do beleive that whilst it isn't in the traditional realms of photography it is good fun and can really have that wow factor that Harold talks about. Whether it is just a passing fad we will have to see.
Wow...I certainly babbled for a bit there. Sorry.

[Robert Amoruso]

Good analysis Rob and I agree, I think you hit a nice balance here. I, we, appreciate your thoughts and hope to see more of your work soon.