too monotone?

[Nieton21]

I took this the other day on a trip to Seaside, OR. I really liked the scene and tried to get a antiqued look with a slight colored monochrome adjustment, and when I took the shot I had a large iso in an attempt to get a little grain also for a age antique look. My question is, is it too bland and not enough contrast? Also any other opinons would greatly be appreciated!

Settings:
Aperture: F10
Focal Lenght: 55mm
Iso Speed: 1600
Exposure: 1/1000 sec

~Nick

[xxpinballxx]

I sorta like the softness of it. Nothing too offensive to the eyes....just one of those warm fuzzy pics. I think if it was a bit closer to the swing I might have liked it a bit more but a nice warmness to it.

[jiminyClickit]

Nieton21

Have you followed the threads about getting an HDR affect? This program is free, easy and gives a richer look to photos, without going too far:

http://www.easyhdr.com/

[Nieton21]

I gave it a shot once on a couple of images and I didn't really like the results so I kind of gave up on the idea...I wish I would have taken a few extras of this shot, but I was just on a walk and didn't really think about it when I took the picture.

[jiminyClickit]

Nieton21,

With this free program, you only need the one photo; it does alterations as if you had several of various exposures.

[hpebley3]

A couple thoughts:
- Straighten the horizon.
- Move closer to the swing set since that seems to be the point of interest.
- Put the swing set on either the top 1/3 line so the foreground pulls the eye to it or on the bottom 1/3 line so the eye falls from the sky to it.
- It seems the surf going through the middle of the swing set sort of distracts from it. Either get higher so the surf is above the top of the swing set or get lower so the surf is narrower.
- Get the clearest shot possible at the point of capture (i.e. don't use ISO 1600 to add grain, only use it to get a shot you couldn't otherwise have gotten). You can add grain/noise later in post processing if that's the look you want. This gives you more flexibility since taking noise out is harder than putting it in.

Regarding the monochrome feel, personally I find this to be much lower on the list of things to be concerned with; overall composition is more important. For this particular image, I think these other issues would improve it more than the issue of how much color saturation to use.

Hope that helps,
Harley Pebley

[Nieton21]

Yay I noticed the horizen after I posted it on here and have already got that fixed. The reason why I didn't move closer to the swing is that I really like the grass in the foreground so I tried to get as close as I could while still keeping the foreground in tact. To be honest I like how the grain turned out using the high iso but I understand what you mean about taking out. Next time I still think I'll use it to add grain because I like the effect but I will definately take a duplicate without it. Also I will pay more attention to the subject and the background (water in middle of swing). Thanks for the advice.

[sana]

It's not monotone, I like the mood. Good choise on fixing the horizon. I find the person on the left edge of the picture a bit distracting, I'd try croping that too (now I'm being picky, cause there's nothing else left to criticize ) Nice photo.