Winter(!) Sunset..

[Mister Mateo]

Took this a mile or so from my home up here in chilly northern Michigan. Nothing like a welcome burst of sunshine to permeate the dull and drab winter months. PP'd in photoshop; CC, please (of course).

[Geoff F]

Well from a purely personal opinion, Matt. This would seem to be one of those scenes where you can either have a good sky with a little bit of snow; or the other way around.

The foreground consists of a large area of snow in deep shadow which is distracting from the alternative, and better, scene.

So I would simply crop to the base of the right side tree and change the image orientation from portrait to landscape mode.

It is possible, although not exactly easy, to lighten the foreground with a bit of editing (or combining 2 photos taken at different exposures) but I would be tempted to try the crop option first.

Otherwise, the sky and placement of trees looks good to me.

[Mister Mateo]

Thank you for your suggestions, Geoff The shadow area of the image was actually greatly underexposed, but I was able to pump up the light levels quite a bit (shot in RAW). Re-examining the photo now, I agree that I should have focused on the sky. I just got carried away with the foot steps in the snow .

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Matt,

I like that quite a lot, I do think there is some room for improvement sort of how Geoff suggests.

I'd crop across the bottom to lose the diagonal track in the lower left corner completely.

Ideally, I'd have the footsteps start from where the camera is, not a little to the left.

Never-the-less, a lovely scene and I wish I was there.

Cheers,

[Mister Mateo]

Thank you for the comment, Dave . You read my mind in regards to the diagonal track in the lower left-hand corner; I was getting pretty convinced that it didn't need to be there.