This looked more dramatic to the eye

[rbyham]

I am a 55 year old noob. Havent had a camera for 20 years but got this Nikon D3000 for Christmas. The shot was taken late afternoon at garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs. It was a beautiful scene to the eye but I was a bit disappointed in the final picture. Can anyone help me get a sense of how this could have been as dramatic as it looked? Details are 1/80 F10 ISO 100.focal length was 38mm on the kit 18-55mm lense...This is also my first post. I hope I have abide dby rules. Sorry no flickr or other online site in place yet. But what could hav emade this pop more? Thanks... Rick

DSC_0092.JPG

[leviathan]

Overall, I think the texture, the contrast in colors and tone, and palette of colors is excellent. I think you captured the beauty of what you saw really well. There is also a beautiful, sacred mood that you also captured.
One element that I think what would aid in helping the image pop relates to the framing. I wish that you would have tilted the camera up just a tad to give some breathing room above the rocks within the frame. This would also eliminate, what appears to be, the edge of a rock or concrete wall at the bottom of the frame, which mildly detracts from the very dramatic light patterns laying over the beautiful rock formations. My guess is that you could go out and re-shoot another morning or afternoon and get similar results with better framing.

[Sterling]

Beautiful color and light. Leviathan's suggestion of providing more breathing room in the framing is a good one. As it is, it looks like you were stretching to get both the paek and the red rocks into the frame. One thing I don't care for is the dark gradient at the top. I assume you added that after the fact? I bet this looks great in a larger size.

[rbyham]

Thanks folks. Yeah I added the top border because the sky was solid blue and looked boring. In terms of framing, it fel tbetter to fill the frame. I took a bunch of shots of this scene and probably have something with more air at the top... let me take a look.

[rbyham]

Here is one that I cropped differently... opened up the sky a bit... is this better? I wish the sky werent so boring. I dont know much about post-produciton yet... maybe that is teh way to improve the sky... thanks for looking... the input is helpful... RickDSC_0096-1.JPG

[Sterling]

I like that opened up sky a lot better. I don't know if I'd fiddle around with that sky. The pastel blue works really well with colors in the rocks. I'd like to see what this version looks like with the foreground grass left in. Personally, I didn't mind it in the first shot - I think having some kind of foreground element provides scale to a landscape shot and helps draw the eye into the scene.

[rbyham]

Lets see if this final p-p attempt incorporates above suggestions. Looks like i may have to move on from Picasa3 for p-p if I am goign to get serious... Thanks all... Rick

DSC_0094.JPG

[Sterling]

I think that looks gorgeous!

[junglebear]

My favourite is still the first one, it's nicely composed and the colours are pleasing to the eye. I think on the second two the colours are a bit too artificial looking.
If you're looking for a more advanced PP program then GIMP is great, it's a free Photoshop equivalent with plenty of tutorials etc. to help you out.