Malawi fisherman

[Neilmac50]

Taken back in 2011 with my trusty Canon G10, on the Shire river in Southern Malawi and edited again today.

1


2

[Manfred M]

From a composition and content standpoint, image 1 is definitely stronger and more interesting, but the lighting (back lighting) is really working against you as the features of the subject are underexposed and very flat. In fact the whole image is rather flat. This is one of those scenes were fill light is needed but virtually impossible to use.

One could try to increase the contrast and dodge the subject a bit, but there is only so much one can do with the lighting.




Image 2 - the lighting is much better and the overall look to the image is superior, but here the composition is not working as well. The backs of people (or most other subjects) are usually not their strongest sides. The direction that the person is looking can lead the viewer into the image, but here, the direction of the boat and position of the subject's head are not doing that either.

[Geoff F]

I wonder if the second image was cropped to 4 x 5 ratio, or square, and some of the left side was lost, would that create a stronger scene and overcome some of Manfred's comments?

[ceylonshoe]

If the original was shot in colour, there may be some leeway in adjusting for contrast/brightness with the colour sliders.

[Tony M]

The first photo definitely has potential, but only if you can lighten the shadows of the man. As Noel suggests, go back to the colour version and develop it again. If it's in RAW format then there should be more room for recovering the shadows without introducing noise.

Tony

[Shadowman]

Nice efforts.