Brig 'O Doon , Alloway , Scotland

[thegman]

Hi to all, I would be grateful for all C&C of my attached shots. Any advice about composition etc would be great.

#1. River Doon flowing down under the Brig 'o Doon. Slight crop was only PP.


#2. Sundial facing from Robert Burns Monument towards the famous Brig O' Doon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brig_o%27_Doon



#3. Stairs leading to the top of The Burns Monument,



#4. Burns Monument Dome.

I know the sky is blown out, it was a very bright cloudy day with the underside of the dome in a lot of shade. I really wanted to capture the detail, but how do I adjust for the daylight?



Thanks in advance for any advice you can give me.

[Benjy]

Like them Gerry,going to a Waddin there later this year

[Shadowman]

Nice series.

[dje]

Hi Gerry

The first one is a very appealing scene with a good composition IMO.

With the second shot, I'd have to ask what you intended with Depth of Focus. The focus point seems to be on the bush with variegated leaves which are sharp whereas the sundial is out of focus and the Brig is a bit too. This doesn't quite work for me but that's just personal taste. I probably would have used a smaller aperture and focused on the sundial.

The third shot is interesting with the light filtering in at the top of the staircase.

With the fourth shot, the blown sky is probably not that much of an issue as it is basically just a plain featureless background to the main subject. You could have used multiple exposure hdr to control this or fill flash.

Overall a nice set.

Dave

[Geoff F]

I wonder if #1 would benefit from a little bit of extra 'boost' Gerry?

Possibly a fraction more highlight brightness or a tiny bit of Local Contrast Enhancement?

If you want to do a shot like #2 you really need to do it the other way around and have the foreground image sharp and the background out of focus; or take two or more shots with different focus points and stack the shots to produce a very deep area of focus.

#3 works fine for me and I don't really have a problem with the sky in #4. OK, blue might be nice but nothing wrong with grey.

[thegman]

Dave thanks for your comments, I agree about the sundial, I was supposed to focus on the sundial and have the brig in background, I took a few shots so i'll check see if any the other ones are in focus. The last shot was frustrating as I just couldn't get what I wanted.

[thegman]

Geoff, thanks for the advice, at the moment I'm not much good with PP, just trying to get my shots sorted.