A Little Fall Color along the Coldwater River at Lake Superior

[Andrew McLachlan]

Ventured down a small trail to where the Coldwater River enters Lake Superior in Ontario's Lake Superior Provincial Park in early September. I was hoping for some lovely fall color, but was about a week early as the colors were about a week behind schedule in the park this year. This scene offered about the best color in the park during my visit. The river followed the shoreline of the lake for a while before making a hairpin turn into the lake. I thought this created a nice perspective with the river beside the lake.

Look forward to comments.

Nikon D200
Nikon 18-70mm lens @ 62mm
ISO 100
f22 @ 1/4 second
Nikon Polarizing filter
mirror-lock

[Jay Gould]

Andrew, while it is very beautiful, was the water really that blue-turquoise?

[Robert Amoruso]

I think you composed this well with the diagonal sand/gravel bar dividing the beach and lagoon. The reflection is nice.

The strong/flat (yes sounds like a contradiction) light does not help the image. The light was not good.

[Rachel Hollander]

Andrew - I too like the comp. The yellows are beautiful and I like the sandbar as a leading line with the 2 different waters on either side.

TFS,
Rachel

[Roger Clark]

Andrew,

I like the colors and the yellow reflection. That yellow reflection makes me want to see more to the right. Do you have that? The sun being well to the left helps make the intense fall colors but also leads to the strong shadows. It still works well in my opinion, just want to see more to the right.

Roger

[Morkel Erasmus]

I like the colours and flow in the composition here Andrew. I agree with Robert, the light was not ideal, and I feel your frustration with not being there at exactly the right time for the colours to peak , most of us can only make so many trips per year, and we try to plan it the best we can, but alas, sometimes it's not to be...

Here's a repost where I toned down overall highlights using luminosity masking to get more out of the sky, and I also increased midtone contrast and boosted saturation selectively (being careful not to overcook the yellows and turqoise).
WDYT?

[Andrew McLachlan]

Thanks folks for the comments, very much appreciated.

Roger, no more room on the right. The yellow trees pretty much ended there as the river curves at that point and the other river bank is just outside the right side of the comp.

Morkel, I like what you did. I'll give that a try. I wish I lived closer to this park, it is a 10-12 hour drive from my home, it has some of Ontario's best scenery for landscapes.

Jay, the water's of Lake Superior can be as turquoise as Caribbean waters...just a tad colder .

[Andrew Aveley]

Andrew , great scene but think Morkmans toning has made it a little more appealing ....10-12 hours ouch :)

[Andrew McLachlan]

Thanks Andrew, much appreciated.