Friday Photo Critique #25

Friday Photo Critique #25

on Mar 26th 2010 with 15 comments

Friday Photo Critique is our weekly community project, where we publish a photograph submitted by one of our wonderful readers, then ask you all to offer constructive feedback on the image.

It’s a great way to learn more about photography, express your viewpoint, and have your own image critiqued. Your response will also be displayed with a link to your website or portfolio, so be sure to enter it correctly when submitting a comment!

Quick Ground Rules

  1. Play nice! We’ve deliberately chosen photographs that aren’t perfect, so please be constructive with any criticism.
  2. Feel free to offer any type of advice – composition, lighting, post-processing etc.
  3. You can also link to photographs that you feel offer a great example of this type of image shot exceptionally well.

Without further ado, here is this week’s candidate for Friday Photo Critique!

The Photograph

Photo Critique

Photographer: Emmanuel Joseph Rodriguez Peregrin

Please let us know what you think in the comments – how would you have approached the scene or taken the photo differently? A massive thank you to everyone who commented last week.

The most constructive and helpful comments will be featured on the site, and you’ll also be given priority to feature your own work in a future Friday Photo Critique!.

David Appleyard is davidappleyard on Themeforest
 
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David Appleyard is a designer and writer based in the UK. He manages Tuts+, along with having founded several design websites including Design Shack and PixelsDaily.  

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  • Richard Browne

    Excellent photo, love the clarity and the colour.

    I like the framing of it but I think it’s a little too void at the bottom and may have framed the horizon slightly lower or just cropped a little off top and bottom.

    And, being extremely picky about it, if this was on a digital camera I would’ve taken the shot again with a slightly shorter exposure to drop the glare from the red lights on left of frame.

    I probably would have concentrated more on the skyscrapers to the right of frame as I think there’s more happening there, my eye falls there immediately, especially thanks to the lightening of the sky around that area.

    Still – nice pic!

    Rich

  • http://www.flickr.com/photos/marianazanatta Mariana Zanatta

    Hello David! that´s a great picture. I was wondering if you cut out the space in the top and the bottom of the picture, maybe the framework would better. How about that?
    [sorry about the bad english]

  • http://grantpalin.com Grant Palin

    First off, it’s certainly a nice image. The colour is decent, and I like the reflection in the water.

    The black expanse at the bottom bugs me, though. Perhaps the image should be cropped along the bottom to reduce the black area, producing a more rectangular image. This has the effect of positioning the waterline in the bottom third of the image, thus following the rule of thirds, and may make the image look better given the content.

  • Nico

    First I want to say it´s a great cityscape photo!
    The reflection of the houses on the water is great.Good sharpness and little noise in the dark parts of the picture.
    First critique point:
    Maybe you should have used a faster shutter speed. The red lights in the left of the picture are a bit too bright i think.
    Second:
    You should have used the 2/3 rule. I really like the cloudy sky, but the black water seems boring to me. I think that would make the poho more interesting and attractive.

    I hope i could help. ;-)

  • http://vitaminhc.com Herson Contreras

    NICE!!! This is a nice image. Just like what Grant Palin said, Remember the “Rule of thirds”, you gotta move that horizon line to the bottom third and then that image will have a greater effect on your viewers.

  • http://www.mngphoto.com Michael Grijalva

    I’d agree with Grant. The black expanse looks a bit funky. There’s just a little too much empty space. Following the rule of thirds on this one would definitely help.
    The colors look good and there aren’t any majorly blown highlights anywhere.

    I also feel you could slightly crop off a bit of the left side. In that last bit there doesn’t really seem to be anything there that I can see. I can see some little lights, but there isn’t anything that adds to the effect of the picture. So in the end I’d say crop so that the horizon lays across a thirds line, and crop off the little dead space on the left side.

  • http://www.flickr.com/ceemonster23/ Christopher

    Great capture. The image appears to be sharp, given the size posted and has an overall great cityscape panorama feel.

    The one thing I would absolutely fix is the expansive black foreground. It’s quite distracting and detracts from the main focal point of your piece, the city skyline. Like Grant Palin said, it’s a perfect opportunity to use the rule of thirds, OR you can crop a bit of the sky out as well and make a great panoramic shot at the expense of the beautifully rendered clouds at the very top.

    As far as colors, they do feel a bit flat to me. There is great separation and sharpness between the colors, but I don’t feel the colors “jumping” out at me as a cityscape should. I would increase the contrast and balance the brightness out just a bit and see where you end up.

    Also, there is a speck of flair on the upper left hand corner. If you decide to crop into a pano, then you should be fine but I would definitely clone that out if you decide to keep it.

  • http://jclossphoto.wordpress.com Jeff

    I agree with Grant. Cropping some of the negative space on the bottom would line up the photo better and remove that distracting element.

    The sky has some definition but it could benefit from a bit more. I’m not a huge fan of over processed HDR type images, but doing a bracketed shot in which you might be able to pull a slightly brighter sky could be good.

    The best part of this image right now in my eyes is the clouds above the lit city – a bit of crop to make it square (bottom and left side) focusing on the sky, buildings and bit of water reflection would also be a good option.

    I’d also like to see this shot a little earlier in the evening, taken during the “blue hour” (about 20 mins after sunset)- it would be a much different feel, but you might like the result.

  • http://none claude brun

    I like it very much,remind me a time dedicated to night photography in Vancouver (BC)
    If I could make a tiny suggestion ,try to take the picture when it is not completely night,you will be amazed of what the sky will show you,colours and clouds
    Anyway I like it this way.
    Good job
    now for Grant comment,there are 2 main spots in the third of the image,on each side.That’s good to me .
    Have a good day and a lot of beautiful pictures.

  • http://www.stevendavisphoto.com Steven Davis

    I would have cropped off a lot of the bottom. All that wasted black space takes away from the shot. I also would have cropped a lot of the left off and focused on more on the city buildings and the sky.

  • http://www.allan-photography.com James Allan

    I’d like to start by saying thank you to the photogapher who submitted this image. It takes courage to put your work in front of others to critique.

    I agree with other comments that the photo could use some cropping. I also think it would benefit from a little post work to reduce the vignette effect in the sky (particularly in the top right corner). Not sure if this was caused by using a lens hood or by something else off shot but it adds a distracting element to the photo.

    Nice focus and excellent colour on this photo though. Well exposed too :)

  • http://zdannphoto.com Zach

    Really nice photo. I like the colors in the sky, as well as the blurring of the clouds. I have tried many times to take a photo like this, but I can never seem to keep the camera still. Great shot!

    • laurence

      Try using a tripod, bean bag or something that will keep your camera steady and try using a self timer of two seconds or something, because even depressing the shutter can induce camera shake :)

  • laurence

    Cool picture, love the reflections and the movement in the clouds :)

    Personally I would have used a smaller aperture, for example f16 maybe, this would have stopped certain areas of light being blown out and it would have created the classic star burst effect which I think goes hand in hand with such exposures and I would also of given the image a tighter crop because there is a lot of dead space that does not add to the picture :)

    I have also noticed like a vignette “dark corners” around the corners of the frame, did you use a filter on a wide angle lens or filter system or a wide angle lens attachment??

    Or was it intentional? Hmm, don’t really think so.

    Another thing to try and remember is to try take these kind of shots in and slightly after “golden hour” which is only really like half an hour, lol. But yeah you will much better lighting in the sky instead of a near dark sky only illuminated by the city lights, unless that’s an effect you are after (don’t have to follow the “rules” like a religion, rules are meant to be broken)

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_hour_(photography)

    So just a recap

    1 Smaller aperture

    2 Tighter crop

    3 Watch out for Vignetting

    4 Golden hour

    Hope this is of help, keep up the good work :)

    Larry

  • http://photography.ionutcirja.com/ Ionut Cirja

    Hello people,

    This is a nice picture. What I would do to correct it is too cut half of the black space from the bottom. That is too much and there is no detail.

    Thanks