Elk Lake, Divide, Colorado

[terrib]

Wildlife photography is what I like the most and it follows that I'm better at it. But occasionally I go for a landscape shot. This lake is very close to where I live so it's easy to try again. I'd be interested in your thoughts on any aspect but mostly on composition. The shot was processed in Lightroom and Color Efex Pro. My thoughts are the following:

1. Try to pull back a bit to include the rock(s) entirely and to give some space to the edge of the lower water on the right. I don't think I can include the edge of the upper section of water as I'm trying to avoid including the road and homes along the road.
2. Try to get a lower perspective while still leaving separation between the lower bank and the reflections of the trees.

[Shadowman]

Nicely captured.

[Ziggy]

I could sit and enjoy this location for a while.

I might clone out the white objects (fence posts?) on the middle right.

[rpcrowe]

Beautiful scene. I selected the area of bare earth (image mid right) and reduced the brightness a bit.... I also cropped a tad off the top and added some structure globally. What do you think of it?

[kalyt]

Hi Terri

Lovely shoot. Well composed. The light and the color is well balanced. But, there is always a but. In the upper left corner where the cloud is, because it's so dark it takes a lot of my attention

[ST1]

You've captured a lovely scene Terri. Your own thoughts on how to set up for a re shoot are all valid, sometimes you need to work a scene like this to get to your ideal composition.
My suggestion for the image as it stands is to crop the bottom of the frame to exclude those rocks, when I use the image in the forum light-box I can see the potential crop as I've suggested which; just leaves a fringe of grass coming in to the bottom of the frame. This gives a anchor in the bottom left corner formed by the grass fringe and the forest reflections it takes my eye through the image going left to right.
Looking at this image I may have been tempted to set up with the little point of land as a focal point with the camera rotated slightly left which may remove the fence line but retain the lake and forest with potential for more reflections and mist given the right weather conditions. That's just my best guess based on what I can envisage from your image.

[IzzieK]

I agree with Peter here (+1 to his assessment) as I also thought of eliminating the rocks on the foreground as soon as I saw them. I kinda like the atmosphere in the middle with the mists and also the reflections. Overall, it is nice place to relax and just enjoy the view. Lucky you to live this close to beautiful.

[Geoff F]

To me, Terri, you have a good location but the light angle is working against you; which is giving a fairly large area of dark foreground with an overly bright distant area and sky.

So yes, I agree with what Richard has done, but that still leaves quite a lot of fairly dark foreground. Which creates two options, crop away half of the bottom left side grass with a balancing amount from the left side; or alternatively, totally crop out that foreground grass strip and rock then go to a more panoramic size which will concentrate the view more on the distant areas?

[terrib]

Richard, thanks for taking the time to edit the shot and provide feedback. I really like your crop and also like how you toned down the background. I'm not sure I'd take the sharpening that far but flipping back and forth between your edit and my original, I agree some sharpening might be in order.

Thanks again!

[terrib]

Thanks Kaare, Izzie & Peter for your feedback.

Peter, I think you are right that I really need to work the scene for composition. Once I'm happy with that, I can try to catch the right weather conditions. Your suggested crop is a valid one, although I'm still thinking to try using the rocks to better advantage. I also like your suggestion of repositioning. We'll have to see, once I get there if it will work because there is a drainage culvert just to the left to contend with. Thanks!

[Wavelength]

Very beautiful scenery

[terrib]

Geoff, thanks for your comments as well. Your thoughts on the dark areas are valid although the shadows don't bother me so much. I need to plan on spending some time with the scene, getting multiple shots as the light changes to see what pleases me. One of the things that attracted me is the mist which I'm guessing would burn off by the time the scene is fully lit. However, waiting just a bit longer for more of the treetops to light up might give a better balance. Recomposing to eliminate the shadow areas gives a very different feel, I think. I'm challenged now to plan some time to really work the scene rather than just stopping in to grab a few shots on my way to the fox den.