" In The Beginning There Was Light"

[selig1656]

P1060341 edited by Raymond Friedman, on Flickr

P1060341 blkwht by Raymond Friedman, on Flickr

More to follow in this series. Comments please.

[Geoff F]

For me, there is a bit too much foreground black area. Half that amount would make a stronger scene.

[Manfred M]

This is a high dynamic range image,with deep shadows and bright highlights. Shooting an image like this one often requires special techniques to manage the deep shadows and bright highlights, The highlights have been well protected here, but the same cannot be said for the shadow details. The blue areas show where the blacks have been crushed, based on a screenshot of the image in Adobe Camera Raw.





While limited areas of pure black are generally acceptable, large areas like the ones shown here are generally not viewed well. The lack of textures end up making the image somewhat uninteresting as there are large areas that have no shades or textures. Special techniques like HDRI using multiple bracketed exposures are used to overcome this deficiency.

[selig1656]

I agree with both suggestions, especially with Manfred, I seem to have a tendency to over darken the background.

[selig1656]

Manfred, here i readdressed capture and thank you.
P1060331 cymk contrast by Raymond Friedman, on Flickr

[Geoff F]

Better, but I would still crop a little from the bottom.

And there are a couple of rather large spots of sensor dust which are visible in the sky area, particularly with the black & white version.