A Landscape Experiment

[JohnReid]

I have the extreme frustration of having beautful subjects to photograph during sunrises, but nothing within a 20km radius of my house for sunsets. This particular evening, I was way to impressed with the sky to not photgraph it, but I needed a subject, so I decided to take one with me, my girlfriend. Since she hadno time to prepare, her hair was tied up, she had no make up on and her only prop was a pillow, but it was good practice for next time.

Note, I put this under landscape and not people because even though my girlfriend is the subject, the theme is people's interaction with the landscape.

Please be totally honest about what you think - I have a thick skin.

The first is probably more of a portrait then a landscape...

[JohnReid]

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[JohnReid]

This next one is of my girfriend and the prop - a pillow. Next time it will be something more appropriate like a kite.

[JohnReid]

I know the first thing that comes to mind when seeing this photo is- photoshop. Whilst I have edited this image, the colours you see in the sky were really there. Here is what I did to the photo.

1. Made two jpeg conversions from the RAW file, one exposed for the sky, one lightened for the grass.

2. Blended the images in photoshop

3. Removed the powerlines(if you look just above the trees, you can see I've done a poor job).

4. Slightly adjusted contrast, cropped and resized for the web

[John Maddock]

Well you've obviously got an attractive and cooperative item of interest there :-)

The problem with people in landscapes is that you end up looking at the person, not the landscape, you just can't help it somehow. Having said that, the second one isn't bad, and would look better with your suggestion of a kite IMO. In fact I quite like the idea of a kite flier silhouetted against the sunset, I think you could be on to something there! If you're into kites at all, there's endless variations to try as well (box kites, stunt kites, coloured kites, Oh and Kites with coloured streamers trailing behind: I used to build those as a kid, I think you've got me started here !

Hope this helps, John.

[thekman620]

Lovely subjects John. It's not only the landscapes of South Africa that are appealing. On the subjective side, I like to see people in landscapes, but with them darkened or silhouetted against the scene, thus being part of the scene, and not dominating it. That's just personal taste, and from a technical point, I could, or probably am totally off base. I've had no training for any kind of photography and do not know any rules for this type of shooting. By the way, I like all 3 shots. Interesting sky on the one you cloned out the power lines. Cheers.......thekman.

[JohnReid]

Thanks John and theKman. I think I chose not to make her a silhouette because the landscape isn't interesting enough. I guess by definition these aren't landscape photos then. Hope you don't mind.

[thekman620]

JohnReid wrote:

Thanks John and theKman. I think I chose not to make her a silhouette because the landscape isn't interesting enough. I guess by definition these aren't landscape photos then. Hope you don't mind.

Don't feel bad about posting these. I think they're good and I think it's good to experiment. We'll call them a crossover..........Cheers........thekman