Carefully composed

[IainM]

I took this in a public garden yesterday, and I carefully decided what to take, and decided to crop it square before I took the photo.

There are a number of things I like about the composition, like the repeating pattern and sprial look of it.
But I'm afraid that it's too dark or too busy to be a wow kind of image. I can't make my mind up on what I think of it.

Any thoughts?



The exif data is not intact because i did a crop from the original and pasted in to a new jpg, but;
Nikon D90
ISO 200
18-200mm lens, I think I used around 35ish?
and using an ND 400 filter, did a 2 min exposure (just trying it out)

[Chandel]

I am new to the landscape photos, but to me it does look a little dark but such a beautiful photo! I love it

[Sterling]

Color balance problem? The rocks and the far bank look really magenta to me.

But I'm afraid that it's too dark or too busy to be a wow kind of image.

Any thoughts?

My first thought before reading your text was:

Wow!

[IainM]

Thanks for the comments, I might try and reprocess it (yay raw).
See if I can't make it a little lighter.

Also, you are right about those stones being red. I did alter the white balance but that was because I thought the greens were too blue originally. Perhaps I went to far, I'll have a tweak at it.

[navcom]

What time of day was it taken?

[Krusty79]

I agree that the image is busy. I find my eye wandering over it and there is really no focal point to settle on. I did look at a histogram of your shot and the majority of the pixels are shifted towards the underexposed side, but since you have the RAW file, that should be correctable.

[dcclark]

Busy yes, but I find the reflections in the pool to be really calm. It's a very nice contrast -- the colorful, busy, arching trees and rocks, and their calm (and simpler) reflections in the pool. In this sense, the busy part is there for contrast, and I like that.

Get rid of that magenta color cast, and I think it's quite excellent.

[Michael_2010]

Looks great to me! It must have been one still day to get away with a 2 minute exposure without movement of the leaves.

[TBrown00]

Originally Posted by IainM

Thanks for the comments, I might try and reprocess it (yay raw).
See if I can't make it a little lighter.

Also, you are right about those stones being red. I did alter the white balance but that was because I thought the greens were too blue originally. Perhaps I went to far, I'll have a tweak at it.

When you change the WB there should be two sliders. One for Amber-Blue shift and another for Green-Magenta.

You should be able to get rid of the magenta without reducing the amber that you added.