Such amazing snowy scenes today , best snowy april by far!

Neil79

Neil79

Neil79

Caporegime
Joined
8 Sep 2006
Posts
39,306
Location
On Ocuk
It was snowing heavily in Whitstable i was celebrating my mums birthday at long reach and i could hardly get the car up the car park... Drove a little further inland 2mins drive and it was even deeper. Up at dunkirk and surrounding areas it was atleast 10-12cm. More snow canterbury way aswell

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Lots of photo's here , please look!

http://s260.photobucket.com/albums/ii18/NeilSouthDivinePhoto/WinterLand/
 
White balance is off, first one has a blue tint, second one has a grey tint

I see that you've followed some leading lines, but it's still not that interesting i'm afraid :(
 
For what it's worth: snow scenes are difficult & quite a few show tints that detract from the punch you should have between the B & W. You didn't pick your 2 best to showcase.Photo 5 is just awful with that blue:( I don't know how experienced you are but try turning the camera to the vertical to alter the composition. 10 & 19 look cropped & this has spoilt them. Have you heard of the rule of thirds? 9, 18 & 20 show the most promise. With the latter I wouldn't have stood in the middle of the road - you didn't want the tree to be centre frame.
Hope this helps - try a yellow filter next time to boost the contrast.
 
Neil79 said:
What would cause that?

ps Did you click the link?
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Auto white balance on the camera, you can correct it in Photoshop however by choosing a custom one on the curves setting. This might however mean that the pictures will appear over exposed.

It's best to set the custom white balance on the camera before hand, also I seem to remember that for shooting snow you often have dial in +0.5->1 stop otherwise it can appear grey.

And no no I didn't, probably best to put them up here than have people go off site to check pics. I know i'm not keen on doing that.
 
Pilgrim57 said:
Photo 5 is just awful with that blue:.
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Its supposed to be like that , was shot through my car window and given the blue effect. A number of people wanted the full size on another forum , that one is personal taste. Not white balance related :D

Yes i have heard of the rule of the thirds , but it seems you either don't crop and people complain and want it cropped you crop and people want it uncropped
:confused:

PaulStat said:
Auto white balance on the camera, you can correct it in Photoshop however by choosing a custom one on the curves setting. This might however mean that the pictures will appear over exposed.

It's best to set the custom white balance on the camera before hand, also I seem to remember that for shooting snow you often have dial in +0.5->1 stop otherwise it can appear grey.

And no no I didn't, probably best to put them up here than have people go off site to check pics. I know i'm not keen on doing that.
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No it wasn't on auto white balance , it was actually set to " Flash " forgot to reset it... I didn't want to post all the photo's because last time i did people complained i posted too many or it went unoticed because i posted too many. Dial in +0.4->1 how do i do this? , is this the exposure which shows up in the view screen?

I'm just getting fustrated and depressed because how ever much i try i'm damned if i do , damned if i don't.. Trying so hard to get good shots , i was up in the hills freezing and cold and taking photo's at one point on my knees to get some good shots. But still i fail , i really feel like hanging my camera up for good. Attention post? , maybe but its how i feel
 
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Neil79 said:
Yes i have heard of the rule of the thirds , but it seems you either don't crop and people complain and want it cropped you crop and people want it uncropped
:confused:

I'm just getting fustrated and depressed because how ever much i try i'm damned if i do , damned if i don't.. Trying so hard to get good shots , i was up in the hills freezing and cold and taking photo's at one point on my knees to get some good shots. But still i fail , i really feel like hanging my camera up for good. Attention post? , maybe but its how i feel
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Re cropping - see Abraham Lincoln "You can please etc"
Never say die! I'd hardly say you failed. Practise makes perfect. I know I struggle with my digital at times compared to my trusty SLR.
Years ago I was at the snow cover battlefield at Waterloo & have lots of colour photos of grey snow:(
 
Cuchulain said:
I think the main problem is there's no real interesting focal point in any of the photos.
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Got to agree with that, there is nothing technically wrong with the photo's beyond the white balance which could be easily fixed in PS they just don't seem to be of anything and the landscape/scenary is not intersting enough to hold the viewers attention.

The second one may have been better if you'd turned slightly to the right so the line of trees draw you eyes into the distance more.
 
Neil79 said:
I'm just getting fustrated and depressed because how ever much i try i'm damned if i do , damned if i don't.. Trying so hard to get good shots , i was up in the hills freezing and cold and taking photo's at one point on my knees to get some good shots. But still i fail , i really feel like hanging my camera up for good. Attention post? , maybe but its how i feel
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I've noticed you've been quite prolific posting photos i here over the last few weeks. I think if you're after genuine C&C then maybe it would be better to post say one picture which is representative of your latest shoot and ask for comments on that only (not that I'm even remotely qualified to give out advice!), you're much more likely to get help that way, rather than posting say 10-20 images, all of a church yard for example and expecting long critiques on the whole lot. This is if you're after C&C that is and not just general "Nice pic!" type comments, which in my experience you're more likely to get on Talk Photography than here. People seem to be more positive about general photo sharing over there and if you're wanting the nice feeling you get from someone making that type of comment TP is the place to be. You seem to have to do a bit more work on this place to get positive comments from what I've seen. You may have noticed I have posted precisely zero photos on here, mainly because as a complete amateur I only take photos of what I like and for my own enjoyment, 99% of which would probably be ignored on here. If you approached you hobby the same way then maybe you wouldn't get stressed when people seemingly ignore you. Just my advice, hope you find it positive.
 
Neil79 said:
I'm just getting fustrated and depressed because how ever much i try i'm damned if i do , damned if i don't.. Trying so hard to get good shots , i was up in the hills freezing and cold and taking photo's at one point on my knees to get some good shots. But still i fail , i really feel like hanging my camera up for good. Attention post? , maybe but its how i feel
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You don't "fail" you're doing the right thing by being outside braving the elements taking the shots, what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger! Just see it as a time to reflect on your photography, and ask what it is you want out of it.

All the times I used to post my wildlife stuff on FredMiranda and watch all my posts die with 0 replies and 4000 views, then I realised that it was simply because the other threads contained pictures which were 10x better than mine, so I went away and forgot about it then reposted some far better stuff which received lots of great feedback and some handy Canadian contacts, I kept at it instead of throwing in the towel.

Don't hang your gear up just because a few people on an internet forum haven't written "Wow amazing pics!!!111" there are some very good photographers on here, I go on a lot of forums and the standard is actually quite high on here even though its technically a computer hardware forum, I frequently see higher quality photos posted here, than on many of the photography forums.

Also, I think its easy to become emotionally attached to pictures you have taken, where you attach a lot more significance to them than other people may recognise, a particular shot may work wonders for you because you associate the picture with the mood/atmosphere it was taken, when infact 0% of that is conveyed in the photograph.

Keep at it :)
 
I think what others have said is true as well. Basically your pictures are fine, they're not blurry as such, in focus ect. The problem I see is that there is nothing of real interest in the pictures. Also, for landscapes they all ways look better wiiiide with a wide angle lens.

I know you wanted to show the snow and how the landscape looks but everyone has seen snowy landscapes and roads about a million times before. You've got to get out of the normal frame of mind of concentrating on the snow and make that secondary. Look around for something that's going to compliment the scenery. Perhaps a frozen berry hanging from a tree with water about to drip (yeah, it's also been done a zillion times but it's still a nice shot), frame that with the scenery behind and instantly it's more interesting.

Try going high, or unnaturally low, find an interesting part of a building, then mix in some interesting anges that compliment it along with positioning yourself to make the most of the light as well as mixing in the high low positioning and it will pay off.

When you see a shot and find what you think is a good place to take the shot from, stop and second guess yourself. then second guess yourself again and again until you find yourself half way up a tree hanging sideways :P

Too many people see a nice scene, stop and click then wonder why it didn't come out great. I do it myself all the time.
 
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I'm with Neil79 on this, I think sometimes we try too hard to make photographs what they're not. He has a point does he not that the photo replicates what he saw? I think the pic in post 15 is quite atmospheric, and reflects those eerily silent snowy days when mother nature is shutting everything up!

Checking the histograms on the photos in posts 15 and 16, the one in 16 confirms to me what my eyes initially saw, ie that it is too bright and the highlights are 'blown'?

But, we all like different things in photgraphs, so that's just my opinion.

Sometimes though Neil79, you've just got to accept that some days aren't that great for making 'wow' type photos, as the thousands of 'unlikely ever to be seen pics' on my hard drives testify! :)

It's more important that you're out there, getting pics, and enjoying your hobby.

I don't know what everybody elses conversion rate is, but I've been into 'serious' photography ever since I was training to be a graphic designer 20+ years ago, and must have taken 10's of thousands of pics. My portfolio of 'keepers' (ie those that I'd be happy to exhibit/sell) stands at less than 100 pics... Either I'm too fussy, I'm not very good, or we just don't get those 'wow' shots very often?

I find the more pics I take, the luckier I get though!! :)
 
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