Landscape Full of People

[CNU]

Hi,
I'm making my first journey into the "people and pets"section of the forums. I normally take pictures of landscapes and other things that are, well, not people. So while walking through the woods with some friends I found a fun opportunity to do something similar to what I normally do as well as including people. Unfortunately, I wasn't prepared for the difficulty of post processing a shot with people in it. This is what I came up with and I think it could be much better, but I can't seem to get the skin tones and expose/contrast on the faces right.



Nate

[GrahamH]

Hi Nate, Nicely composed shot with the people in a circle. I would suggest a tighter crop to make the people more prominent.
Colours do look a little washed out, but not way out of whack.
Nice picture, nice location, nice people (ah what it is to know young people who are more photogenic, makes life so much easier).
Graham

[Donald]

Nate

I agree with Graham re the people. I think the idea behind this is excellent.

But, I think if we're going to do group portraits; i.e. the people are posing in order to be the main subject(s) in the picture, then we have get close enough in on them to see them well. They are the subject.

However, to follow the implications in the title of your image, if we want to people to be part of the landscape, then I think we have to use them in a more abstract way and not have them facing teh camera is the 'traditional' smiling pose.

You have positioned the people to work in the landscape. But they are all adopting the straight on 'look-at-the-camera' positions. I think they needed to be in different positions, not looking at the camera and made to be part of the landscape, rather than a group of people placed in the landscape.

Hope that makes some sense.

[Geoff F]

I would agree with the idea of a tighter crop, Nate. In fact I would remove quite a bit from the right side, and just a little from the top; which would change the image size ratio though.

I think you could completely lose that right side tree

[Maritimer1]

That is such a great idea for a group shot! Greens are horrible to work with when you're trying to get the skin tones right, aren't they? What actually did you do in post processing?