An attempt at Landscape photography.

[Kohmos]

I'm pretty new at all this, only been into photography for 6 months or so, but I'm fairly proud of this shot, I'm interested in what I could have done to make it better so I can learn for future shots. This was taken in Barcelona.

[SwissJon]

It's very nice.. Could you supply the Exif data please?

[Kohmos]

Originally Posted by SwissJon

It's very nice.. Could you supply the Exif data please?

Shutter Speed:1/80 second
Aperture:F/9.0
Focal Length:20 mm
ISO Speed:100

[BCampbell]

Kohmos, you spotted a nice scene with some nice symmetries. The statues frame it well.

A couple of things that jump at me.

First, and most importantly, the lighting is totally flat. It's hard to make well-lit landscapes on an overcast day, but this really suffers for it.

You have some nice foreground subjects and nice background subject but there's nothing in the middle ground. This makes the statues take more importantce and really draw attention and sort of suck the life out of the landscape. It doesn't help that they're very dark, weighing the whole image down. I think the amount of railing you included doesn't help either; it could possibly have some symmetry with the amount of sky at the top but being so much darker without anything to balance it gives it more weight.

I think one way you could have avoided all of that would be to use a longer focal length. Wider is not always better for landscape. Using something longer, even into the telephoto range, would help flatten the distance between your foreground and the actual landscape. I guess that is probably not possible, you probably didn't have much space to back up to preserve that framing, but even say 50mm would help. Something to think about.

I also notice that there's some lens distortion on the railing that's distracting, and those four poles or whatever they are are kind of weird. I'm also not a fan of the panoramic aspect ratio but that's way more subjective.

Nice scene though, I'd like to see this with some more dramtic light.

[faeriegodess612]

I'd have to respectfully disagree with you Campbell.

Wouldnt this technically be called a Cityscape? I don't see much wrong with it,.... I can see the lens distortion, but it doesnt really bother me. The colors could be warmed up just a bit,... other than that, I like it.

[Jonbar18]

I like this shot, great composition. The colours need quite a boost, as others said-but that could be easily fixed.

I also would have loved to see the statue and railing positioned in a way where they were not covering any buildings or other parts of the city-although I bet that would have been impossible. Just a thought.

[milosh]

Hi Kohmos,

I'm on the same side as BCampbell here. I think it is nice that you used a foreground element in a Cityscape (which people don't do as much as they should, IMO), just like in a landscape. I also feel that the statues are visually taking up too much of the frame, and having the fence totally horizontal doesn't help either. They act as anchors for the view. Another thing that doesn't help is that dominant features in the background are so far away. I'm not sure if you could achieve something better with a telephoto lens and this same scene. I think it would be better to find a spot from which you have a view of a foreground element, and some dominant background elements, like building roofs, churches, cathedrals. Maybe even use a telephoto to "bring" them closer to each other. This way you would also have a foreground element, but the view could continue to travel to the more interesting, background elements. Maybe even from this very spot but using only one statue and a more dominant background (maybe there are some interesting objects to the sides of the Magic Fountain square, I'm not sure). And shooting in some better weather would help make it more visually appealing.