Freedom ; Liberté : For Rick
I'm sorry to all of my friends on this site. I have already answered discreetly on a photo of the person. The comment has been deleted. I replied discreetly after a description, the comment was probably not understood. So I would totally understand if you would go your way today and not comment on this photo today but I cannot but respond to the comment left today on my photo from yesterday.
I know this picture is not sharp enough for Thalie running (I haven't enough light so not enough speed) but I wanted to express the happiness of doing the things we love.
Rick , I will answer point by point :
"Since everyone has applauded this image let me take a little time to pick it apart and make some suggestions."
Maybe everyone applauded this image, just because they liked it, or maybe to make me happy on this sad day. But as you do not read the explanations a priori ...
"1. Landscape Images shot with a lens 20-100mm is a better choice than the 200-500mm that you used."
I went there to take pictures of birds and dogs but what prevents me from taking pictures of landscapes to have another look? I would never have managed to have this yellow bush with a 24mm. You must also know how to break the rules ...
"2. New cameras can handle noise at higher ISO but ISO 50 or 100 will have little or no noise.
3. Shutter speed at 1/60 second is fast enough on a calm day like this one or slower if using a tripod."
2 and 3 If you look at the exifs, which you must have done, you must have seen the hour: 5:28 pm in France, the day is falling. There isn't much light anymore and I was in a shaded area.
And as you have noticed, I am with a 200 / 500mm: to take a photo without motion blur, it is recommended to have a speed at least equal to the focal length ... (except to have a tripod like you suggest it, but since I was out for a walk with my dog ... it is not very practical ... as with photos of birds in flight, the tripod will not be of much use to me ...)
"4. Do not let the camera control everything by shooting in auto. Shoot in shutter or aperture priority so you can control both the speed and the aperture as the offset. "
I do not let the camera decide as you say: all my photos are taken either in aperture priority, or, for sports photos in speed priority or all manual.
"5. Stop the aperture down for a more DOF."
Not enough light. You don't know the shooting conditions
"6. For better color saturation (depending on the light) set exposure bias on Nikon -1/2 or Canon -1/3 as a starting point. If the subject has a lot of white avoid blowing the highlights by adjusting the exposure bias down to -1 to -2 stops or more. The opposite is true if it is dark don’t lose shadow detail by setting exposure bias up +.5 to +1 stop or more. If the dynamic range of the image goes from black to white is really wide then a HDR may be called for."
When I need to correct the exposure, don't worry, I know where the button is ... and as you point out to me below, shooting in raw also allows me to correct this in PP
"7. Before pressing the shutter examine all corners of the image in the viewfinder to make sure that is well composed. Does the composition have a subject? Does your composition have leading lines? If applicable have you applied the rule of thirds and is the horizon level. (In your shot the bush on bottom right is very distracting. You could have moved left or right to eliminate the distraction.)
8. Take several images from different angles and composition. Be super critical when reviewing your images and keep only the best image(s) for processing later on the computer. "
7 and 8 Do you know the place? on the left, I am in the water, on the right, I no longer see the yellow bush ...
So yes, the bush on the right is annoying but it does not prevent me from savoring the beauty of the reflection.
and yes, as weird as it sounds to you, i'm not some brainless blonde who takes random pictures ... my focus point is on the reflection line, on the yellow bush and it's really weird: the yellow bush is on the strong point at the top left and the reflection of this bush is on the strong point at the bottom left ... I think I have integrated the rule of thirds well ...
I took different angles, in portrait format (we no longer see the bush but we no longer have the perspective, on the other side but the light is less golden ...). I took about ten photos of this bush and kept the one I liked best. How do you know the approach I took before posting a photo ...
"9. Shoot in RAW versus JPG as Post Processing (PP) gives you more latitude for correcting problems. Every composition will have problems no matter how careful you are. A piece of trash, leaves or other distractions on the water, one side needing to be toned down or brightened up. Buildings may have trapezoidal problems which can be corrected in post processing but if you do then the image will have to be cropped. With that in mind leave extra margins around the building(s) so you have room to crop."
I don't know what allows you to devine in which format I shoot my photos. You probably have a crystal ball in addition to my exifs, but all my photos are taken in RAW and then edited in Capture NX-D, software dedicated to Nikon. Sometimes in Luminar and sometimes in Silver Effex Pro for B&W. Some benevolent photographers in this group give me sound advice and I happily implement them to progress.
I keep the idea of the margins around the buildings for the crop, finally a constructive advice ...
"10. If you are going to shoot a lot of landscape image consider getting a circular polarizer as it reduces the confusion of light for better color saturation in addition to bluer skies."
Thank you for this interesting advice, that's what I do ... see photo of Tenerife ...
"Snapshots seldom result in good images.
It is better to have well composed images as result of thought and procedure rather than a few by accident…"
you have a very unflattering vision of the composition of my photos
but as I told you before: if you don't like my images: go your way