Giant's Castle

[Dubbs5050]

Giant's Castle, South Africa 2004

[MB1]

This is a tough one since I suspect you can't easily go back there and reshoot.

There is a lot of contrast here so the shadows have lost a lot of detail and the sky is nearly blown out. A split neutral density filter helps match the sky brightness to the ground and would have been helpful here.

The other problem I see here is that your mid-ground and background are quite interesting but the foreground doesn't add a lot to the image. The thing to do would have been to move around to get less foreground or find a bit more interesting stuff for the foreground.

It does look like an interesting place so if you can get back there spend some time setting up your shot and/or shoot closer to sunrise/sunset if you want an outstanding landscape image instead of an image of an outstanding landscape (which is what this is).

[GB1]

I think it's a nice shot overall. The outline of the mountains and the greenery and multiple planes all work. I don't know if I agree with MB on the foreground, I've seen a lot less interesting ones in my own photos (I'm constantly dealing with that issue in the desert, finally bought a cattle's skull as a prop, but have yet to really try it..). The sky is blown a bit, but you may be able to fix this in PS (mask it, adjust the density, etc, then clean up the transition areas pixel by pixel as needed). Nice shot. I don't see why they call it Giant's Castle btw.

G

[Dubbs5050]

I think it's a nice shot overall. The outline of the mountains and the greenery and multiple planes all work. I don't know if I agree with MB on the foreground, I've seen a lot less interesting ones in my own photos (I'm constantly dealing with that issue in the desert, finally bought a cattle's skull as a prop, but have yet to really try it..). The sky is blown a bit, but you may be able to fix this in PS (mask it, adjust the density, etc, then clean up the transition areas pixel by pixel as needed). Nice shot. I don't see why they call it Giant's Castle btw.

G

Thanks for your comment....the preserve we camped at is called Giant's Castle....Those mountains are part of the Drakensburg Mountain range (don't quote my spelling)....

[Len J]

+1 on MB1's comments.

Len