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Mats Honkamaa
10-01-2009, 01:06 AM
http://makesit.nu/mats/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/windmill.jpg
Camera: Canon EOS 400D
Lense: Sigma 18-50/2.8
Focal Lenght: 18 mm
Exposure Program: Aperture priority
Shutter Speed: 1/1600 sec
Aperture Value: f/3.5
ISO: 400

Earlier posted this in the "Travel and Cityscapes" forum. Would like some critics and tips on how to improving so re-posting here, hope it is ok.

At the biggest island of Finland, Hailuoto, I found this old windmill.

Did some photoshopping that I think can be refeered to as "fake HDR".

About the exposure maybe I should have had smaller aperture for added depth of focus and I probably should have shot it at ISO 100.

Harold Davis
10-01-2009, 02:32 PM
hi mats, very interesting old windmill here. i like that as a foreground object and i like how the stalks lead you right up to it. the light here seems harsh? the stalks look overcooked or blown lacking density and detail. you are right about the aperture. a smaller one may have helped get some detail there. from your position here, i might have panned right some to exclude the barn on the left and include the tree on the right. the clouds are really cool, but need some noise reduction.

this is a scene definitely worth exploring some more!!!

Robert Amoruso
10-02-2009, 08:19 AM
Mats,

In this scene I like the look of the clouds and the windmill. I would have walked up to the windmill, used an extreme wide-angle or fisheye got on the ground and photographed up capturing the windmill against that sky.

In the left you clipped a building and on the right the green tree, that leaves the composition feeling cramped.

I like what you are trying to do with the high contrast but I don't feel all the elements are falling together well in this image. As Harold mentioned, the rows of stalks do act as a leading line to the mill and the sky is appealing but the heightened contrast just seems to be too much with all the different elements in the image competing with each other. Simplifying the image as I mentioned above may have been they want to go here.

Roman Kurywczak
10-03-2009, 08:50 AM
Hi Mats,
Very good advice and points made above! You definitely could have easily sacrificed some SS for the DOF In the field so just keep that in mind for next time out. I would have preferred if the windmill had a bit of seperation from the BG trees on the right and moving right and pointing more left may have accomplished that but may have also introduced more un-wanted elements.

I do think you can eliminate some of the compositional issues mentioned above by cropping out the building entirely (or clone/patch if you are OK with such things) and then crop the right in the tallest part of the evergreen ....then if you want to keep proportions.....take it off the top even though the sky is very nice.
I feel the biggest issue here is in the PP'ing so going back and lessening some of the contrast and see what you can come up with. I do see a slight halo around the evergreen so just keep that in mind when re-working this.