Evening on Lake Ontario

[pasusan]

This was taken looking away from the lowering sun on the shore of Lake Ontario in New York.

Any comments and/or criticisms are welcome...

[Wavelength]

That is a really inviting image; i liked it; i feel a breeze....

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Susan,

Two suggestions;
a) I would consider cropping so the shore line emanates from the lower left corner, thus losing an area of dark foreground
b) I would also suggest downsizing your finished images to be no more than 1000px tall (so the fit on people's screens at 100%), also, after the downsize, it will need a re-sharpen, general figures I suggest are (for UnSharp Mask = USM); 80-100% amount, 0.3px radius and a threshold of between 0 and 3, the lower threshold figure for the less noisy (after downsizing) an image is - this one looks fine at 100% even before downsizing, so 0 threshold should be good.

Good exposure and level horizon - and I can see why you took the shot.

Hope that helps,

[Geoff F]

The only problem with a crop is that it will probably mean taking too much from the left side as well. Unless you change to a different size ratio. 5 x 4 might be possible if this has already been cropped and you have some spare area on the sides with the original image. Otherwise a square crop could be worth considering.

I would certainly look for some form of crop from the bottom though, as Dave mentioned.

[pasusan]

Thanks very much for the comments...

Nandakumar - I'm so glad you like it!

Dave - I appreciate the suggestions - see the cropped version below. I am a sort of stick-in-the-mud for a 4:3 (or 3:4) aspect ratio which I admit I should relax about. I am wondering about the 1000px tall though - when I open it in lightbox it is all there for me. I set my exports from Lightroom to be 1600px for the longest side - does that not work for most people's screens?

Geoff - maybe you remember I don't like to change my aspect ratio - but for purposes of display here I suppose I can loosen up. I do agree with you and Dave there was too much dark nothingness on the bottom.

Here ya go:

[Dave Humphries]

I set my exports from Lightroom to be 1600px for the longest side - does that not work for most people's screens?

Hi Susan,

That is the correct limit for TinyPic (which you use), but if you think about it; most people's screens are not that tall (mine is 1920 wide by 1080 tall), so when the image orientation is 'portrait' (not landscape), it goes 'over height' and gets scaled to fit by the web browser - and that (very) often makes it 'softer' than it should be.

If possible (and I don't know if it is n LR), I recommend that if the orientation permits, then the width may be up to 1600px, but only if the 1000px height is not exceeded. Even this disadvantages many laptop users though, but then a laptop screen commonly have other image display issues that will make their experience less anyway. (e.g. precise viewing angle necessary)

I am a sort of stick-in-the-mud for a 4:3 (or 3:4) aspect ratio

I rarely print, so I am, if anything, biassed the other way, I'll always crop to suit the composition and to heck with standard ratios not saying I'm right, just that is what works for me.

I think it also works for this image viewed here too, I like the new version.

Thanks,

[Mito]

The second one for me. I love this time of day.

[Otavio]

Hi Susan,

I rarely print, so I am, if anything, biassed the other way, I'll always crop to suit the composition and to heck with standard ratios not saying I'm right, just that is what works for me.

Hi, Susan. Nice image. If that matters, I would like to mention that I think (and do) absolutely like Dave does. I always crop to give my images the better composition aspects.

Regarding the image, a minor sugestion: Have you thought of lighening the shadow areas just a lilttle?

Thanks for sharing. It looks a very nice place!

Cheers!

[pasusan]

Dave - thanks very much for the explanation of screen size and pixels - I will keep that in mind as I'm sure LR will be better at resizing than any browser... And - I'm glad you like the cropped one better - I can see that it presents much better.

Brian - thanks for viewing and commenting - I agree - it is a nice time of day

Otavio - I appreciate your comments. As for lightening up the shadows - not a good idea with this one - I actually did a bit of selective burning to hide some tire tracks (don't tell anyone). Thanks!