Lamp post at the beach

[AlwaysOnAuto]

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Alan,

I'm afraid this one really isn't working for me, if you hadn't stated the subject in the thread title, I'd never have guessed.
That said, it is dead centre in the frame.

However, we can learn much from mistakes and others may learn even if you disagree with me, heck even I'm learning from this photo - just by thinking this through and writing out why I wouldn't have taken this shot or presented it like this.


There's a theory that the subject of a photo should be; the largest, brightest and sharpest thing in the shot and also not fighting for the viewer's attention against other things that are bolder by brightness or colour.

I think you can see that this shot fails that theory on almost every count, so the question is why?
What could you have done?
I am assuming you had a little spare time to 'work the scene' - if you didn't, my apologies for being 'harsh' with you (ask Izzie) and treat the ideas below as a theoretical exploration.


The scenario; the Lamp post caught your attention and you wanted to make a picture of it and (I guess) show the context of it being at the beach.

The first question I ask myself, not having been there, is was this the sole example of the lamp post?
Might an alternative have been found that wasn't right next to a tree trunk which completely dissects the frame?

The background sunshine seems brighter than that on the lamp post and tree, if you had delayed a few seconds or minutes, might this have been reversed? (assuming the difference is due to a cloud partially obscuring the sun)
Or could (fill) flash have been used to light the subject better?

Red is a very attention grabbing colour, could you have shot from a different angle to exclude many, or all of the red items in the background? (along with any other bold colours) either laterally and/or by shooting up at the sky more?

I appreciate it was bright - and (from EXIF) your shutter speed was already up at 1/640s and ISO down at 100, aperture unknown, could a wider aperture have been used?
Perhaps using an ND or polarising filter to 'lose' some exposure and allow an even wider aperture to blur the background with a thinner DoF?

Could you crop in PP to concentrate more of our attention on the subject? (rather than leave it 'as shot')

Could you use other PP methods to help; e.g. monochrome conversion, selective blurring and sharpening, dodging and burning?

I hope you know me well enough to know that I'm trying to be helpful, and I'm not just 'having a go'.

All the best, Dave

[AlwaysOnAuto]

Dave, no problems with your observations.
Did you happen to look at it full size?
I'll assume you did.
This was one of the first times I used a telephoto lens, Nikkor 80-200 f4, on my A7ii camera, which is relatively new to me still. I had been shooting from an elevated position I spotted when I went down to the beach today, mostly using the lens at 200 and shooting distant objects. I decided to shoot the lamp post just to see what kind of bokeh I'd get when focusing close(r). I don't have any filters for this lens other than the UV filter that is on it for protection mostly. I probably, in hind sight, should have played with the aperture some. You're right, this is 'as shot', not a crop which might help it somewhat.
I don't have a flash for this new-to-me used camera so I'm out of luck there.
I'll try to 'think' more in the future when experimenting like this.
Thanks for the comments.

[Wavelength]

Alan, i too had a nearly parallel feeling while i looked at the image, but not with so much of exactness as Dave does. The very coconut trunk is a distraction to the subject; further, the right side of the image is filled with constructions which do not contribute to the lively subject of the crowd in the beach....Do you have other shots from the same location?

[AlwaysOnAuto]

The palm trees tended to get in the way.

[Wavelength]

That is nice; you cannot now clone out such a big palm tree trunk; please clone out the remnants from right bottom corner