Sunrise over Stafford Moor.

[Keith]

Stafford Moor Fishery in North Devon,I'm off there tomorrow for a weeks holiday with a couple of friends. Fishing, photography and a few beers, but not necessarily in that order!
Took this shot with my D40 last September whilst down there.

[Wirefox]

Crusty

A beautifully moody image. I love what I see so trying to analyse how it could be better is pointless for me.

[crisscross]

agree with Wirefox - did you drop the 40D in by mistake?

PS how about duplicating to the May challenge Keith? Join Team 'can't remember what it said on the front'

[Donald]

Superb! Enough said.

[Geoff F]

I think the only way you could have improved anything here was by persuading the birds to fly in a regular V formation. Which, I suspect, may be a little above your powers.

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Keith,

Can I be the awkward one that has a suggestion?

It is a great image, very tranquil, and the only thing I'd suggest is to crop just 10% off the left hand side, which just takes the almost central island a little more towards the left hand third and, I think, balances it more.

I say this because there's nothing really going on in the left hand quarter frame; nothing in the water, or the sky, so losing a little nothing might give something. Or am I just too 'stuck' in my ways of applying the rule of thirds?

Anyway, have a good break and don't do too much fishing or photography - hang on, that don't sound right

Enjoy yourself,

[Keith]

Thanks for your comments, I hope weather conditions this week coming will let me take some good pictures of this 'anglers paradise'.
I love the place, I have been staying there on holidays for the past 7-8 years and the owner is an absolute gem, its a lovely part of the world.

[Keith]

Hi Keith,

Can I be the awkward one that has a suggestion?


I say this because there's nothing really going on in the left hand quarter frame; nothing in the water, or the sky, so losing a little nothing might give something. Or am I just too 'stuck' in my ways of applying the rule of thirds?

Thanks Dave, is this better?

[Dave Humphries]

That was quick, but shouldn't you be packing?

Yes, I think so, although I am but one voice

[SRH]

Make that 2 voices.

I didn't see the fix suggested by Dave, as I really liked the original, but after seeing the edited version, Dave was right. The new crop takes the focus away from the larger dark island, and lets my eye see the other islands in the background.

[Daniel Salazar]

I agree with SRH, with the second image the attention of the viewer goes to more interesting points, like for me where the birds and their reflection.
Great!

[milleniummuppet]

First of all crusty, your images are awesome ! - (Definitely one of my favorites in this forum).
I see what is meant by the 'thirds' comments, and it does definitely pull the eye towards the islands more in the cropped version.
However, I don't think I really like the squareness of it, although you really wouldn't want to crop any of that wonderful vignetting else it would destroy the image.
The original is still using offset thirds, and I personally don't think this is a problem.
I also applaud you for straying from the rule - if we followed the rules too much we would never make images that were entirely unique.
Experimentation makes us learn from things that didn't work, which helps us too grow more skillful, and eventually develop aunique style - much like kaskias has accomplished with great success.
So that's my opinion on that one anyway.

What I REALLY like about this image is the atmosphere.
It is a very soft, mysterious, image which is often difficult to execute as well as it is here.
There is also a wonderful amount of grain in the image, which works 'perfectly' - something else which is very difficult to achieve.

Well done.

[Davey]

I much prefer the second myself. As for the squareness thing maybe content aware scale if you're using cs4? Might not work but you could shift the dark central isle left and maintain the aspect ratio so it isn't squared off like a normal crop (or distorted like a normal x_scale).

Just a suggestion (and my ideas often range from questionable to dangerous ), I think it might work though since the lack of anything going on in the left side makes it suited to the technique (technically that is) and if you apply a mask to the band on the left you want to restrict the scaling to it should be fine. If it is still a little too square at the end due to the loss then you could slightly upscale the right part too.

[milleniummuppet]

I thought about mentioning content aware.
I have never really come across a situation where it could be valuable yet, and it could indeed be useful here.

By the way, does any one actually know how it works?
How can you stretch an image without distorting it, I have played with it before, and marveled at the results - but I have no-idea.

[iPhillip]

Its an interesting concept, content aware scaling. But its only in developement stages and is really quite an achievement if you get it working perfectly with your image. Like the title says, its "content aware", to give you a rough idea it analyses your photo, detects what may or not be your focal (Ithink you can set it to look for people, faces etc) and trys to keep the chosen focal or point in the image intact by stretching the other parts of the image in order to reach your aspect ratio without distorting elsewhere.

Great image by the way. Serene, more than moody.

Reminds me of this morning when I went out duck shooting. Should've taken my camera, there were some good opportunities.

[Keith]

Thanks for comments.

I have just returned home from a weeks holiday at Stafford Moor, unfortunately I had little time for photography as the fishing was very good and took most of my time up, can't wait to get back there again next year