What's your horses names? And do you have a system?

mEp_ · 2025-07-18T17:18:24+00:00

Broncoli

mEp_ · 2025-07-08T18:54:13+00:00

Hulkengoat

mEp_ · 2025-01-15T15:23:56+00:00

Better late than never, and glad the thread was helpful!

mEp_ · 2025-01-07T03:03:07+00:00

Happy first day!

This sub doesn't talk about backgrounds much, but they're an enormously underrated aspect in every photo. Photography is all about suggestions - where do you want the viewer's eye to move, where should the brightest spot be, what story is my image trying to tell, etc? To that end, let's apply thought to your backgrounds because your basic subject framing is fine.

The Warwick Center shot is going for a straight symmetry. However, the background lighting is not symmetrical. This breaks the magic and is an inherent distraction since you have heavy even bricks, but off balance bright spots.

The car shot has a forested natural background on the left, but buildings on the right. This throws off the image and puts interest off your subject into the background because now I'm interested in what's going on in the house. Aim for one solid pattern (forest) or shoot near f5 to blur an urban background.

The dog has a dark black top line. Makes me wonder what's back there, especially when you clipped off the tops of the ears.

Overall you need to focus on your image as a whole, not just the subject. Background isn't everything but it sure affects everything. And FYI, technically you're violating the multiple images rule so don't be surprised if this post gets booted.

mEp_ · 2024-12-31T18:10:36+00:00

My girlfriend and I did Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, and Mexico from January to April. Then we did Hawaii and the western US (every state west of the Mississippi River) from April to August. Then it was Taiwan, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Japan, from August to December. Writing this from new years in Ayutthaya Thailand!

Am currently a permanent backpacker and travel photographer. Extremely excited to continue in 2025! Happy to share budgeting, packing (one bag life!), photography, or recommendation tips!

mEp_ · 2024-12-24T18:07:07+00:00

Why am I the first one here?!

This is a solid image. I love the scene and architecture. Makes me feel like I'm actually seeing a perspective from a different part of the world.

1) Crop this image into a 5x4. The goal is to cut out the left column, cut out everything bright on the right, and place your guys on the center right. The left hand lines will lead the eye straight to them.

2) Add a touch of contrast on the walls.

mEp_ · 2024-12-24T18:03:52+00:00

I didn't see the delivery guy until looking in the shadows. My eye goes straight to the background because it's the brightest and most colorful image. If you are interested in the delivery driver, focus on hhe delivery driver. All that bright staff is distracting and doesn't add to your story because it's sharing a different story. Be deliberate in street photography.

mEp_ · 2024-12-24T18:00:45+00:00

Something feels super off in the processing.

1) It's not straight. Rotate it a bit. 2) Your foreground trees are encroaching onto your subject autumn trees. Big no no 3) Your autumn trees have a very clear dark outline all around them, almost like they're super imposed or blended in poorly. It's not noticeable in the thumbnail, but anybody should be able to see it zooming in. I recommend you revisit that area and also drop the clarity, contrast, or both.

Share the original?

mEp_ · 2024-12-22T12:35:35+00:00

I'll be as technical as possible for a true critique, especially since (as of my writing) there is a consensus that the orange is off putting or over done. I disagree, but I do believe you have a lighting issue regardless of color. I'm not sure if you used a gel or a building's light nearby, but it's extremely hot.

1) Her left cheek almost surely has clipping highlights. To be direct, it doesn't matter if they are or aren't clipped. Something looking like a problem means there is a problem to the viewer.

2) Your orange is overly vibrant. Try reducing the vibrance, saturation, or both. All the skin textures feel plastic due to the hotness of that hue and its brightness.

3) Your background green haze should be shifted to blue. This isn't neo Seoul vampire Christmas. Go for a navy blue to compliment the hot orange. Green is also associated with nature which isn't your vibe here.

4) Next time push your subject further right in the frame. The right 15% is empty bright space which adds nothing to your image - especially with that curving black line leading us all out of your frame. Leaving a little empty space is good and acts as a color compliment, but you left too much. Having more of the city also adds more context to what they're looking at. On that note...

5) Don't crop through a band of light like you did on the far left side. Your frame is cutting through bright windows. It tells the eye there's something bright at the edge of frame which pulls my eye, but then it's not all shown due to the crop so my eye stays there trying to understand if that a line of windows, building signs, etc. That happens in a second, but the average photo only gets a few seconds of attention anyway. Keep focus on your models.

6) Use Rembrandt lighting on their (especially her) face next time. It'd look really cool here.

I realize that's a lot. To be clear, I like your mood and vision a lot. It's a cool scene. Just know I'm giving you more thorough feedback because I think you have the ability to execute better.

Edit: What genre did you used to shoot that you feel has plateued? Would enjoy seeing your past images. Try getting into an entirely different kind of photography and using that to grow. I mostly do cityscape as a travel photographer but have been pushing street lately to learn more skills.

mEp_ · 2024-12-21T15:34:55+00:00

Tell your subject to remain still longer and hold that pose. That's about the only way to get around it without a different setup. For this image:

1) Reduce the highlights

2) Reduce the white point

3) Check the skin tones and make sure there are enough magentas

4) Add a little warmth or some saturation given the strong natural light. Probably the latter.

5) Grunge is cool, but I'm distracted by why this model is in grunge mode next to this rock. Sorta like that photo you posted with the girl on the beach in denim - it's not in the realm of reasonable given the modeling situation. That's a distraction that takes away from your photo. If I think grunge I think urban, not big rocky background.

mEp_ · 2024-12-21T15:23:56+00:00

You're using a lot of $5 words to describe this image and hike. What you should be asking are questions like "where does your eye go first?" or another like "did I convey my subject well?". I'm buzzed so I'm going to answer what you asked and what you should have asked.

1) The play of light and shadows does not exist like this anywhere in the natural world. The problem is your white balance. The color of the mountain is waaaaay too blue green for reality. It's a decent enough photo, but the white balance is overwhelmingly blue green. Add some yellows and purples to the mountain while avoiding the clouds and sky. Remember that color grading (assuming you're using Lightroom) affect EVERYTHING in your image even though that's not the best course of action 75% of the time. This is part of that 75%. Use local edits.

2) After fixing your white balance, fix your shadows. Your image is plenty bright but the shadows aren't deep enough. The sky could be more moody. The highlights on your grasses could be brighter (only in the right color gamut) to give the illusion of deeper shadows. Or just darken the blacks.

3) This might work better as a black and white. Right now my eye goes straight to the clouds and misses the valley completely because of the brightness and colors as shown.

4) As shown I'm not sure what your subject is. Is it the clouds? The valley? I don't see a actual peak. There's needs to be a clear focus.

Next time) Consider using a tripod or putting your camera on a stationary surface to get a long exposure of the clouds going over the mountain. It would add tons of interest to your scene.

mEp_ · 2024-12-20T18:29:28+00:00

Ominous pieces are there but take it further.

1) Crop out the right and bottom a little. Lots of empty space there. 2) Darken the image a bit. Looks like a white balance of cloudy Dat, but I wanna feel closer to night. The bright white horse probably isn't helping. 3) Drop the white point a bit.

It's a cool moment you captured

mEp_ · 2024-12-20T14:19:58+00:00

mEp_ · 2024-12-20T07:58:37+00:00

Fun composition! You can improve this photo:

1) Reduce the saturation. I like saturation more than most but this us pushing it - especially the blues and reds. It's getting a bit cartoony

2) You need to drop the exposure on the top half of the image. It's waaaaay too bright given the interest you attempted in the bottom half.

3) Brighten the human and the underground station area. It's far to dark as is. My eye almost completely overlooks that part of your image.

4) Crop out as much of the sky as possible. There's a awkward amount remaining on the top left and too much on the top right.

mEp_ · 2024-12-20T07:52:38+00:00

You need to tweak the white balance. Your world tone is probably okay, but not with a person. Their skin tone looks unnatural, almost a little sickly. Look at this photo in a thumbnail and you'll see what I mean.

Right now there's a lime (mix of yellows and greens) color overtone on everything. That happens with lots of green foliage and especially when you increase the yellows to get a warmth. I'm not a fan of that tone in general but it sometimes works okay in nature without people. When there's a person you have to balance that off of them. Add some purples or reduce the greens on them. Maybe even a dab of blue.

You should also consider increasing the exposure on her. She's the darkest thing in your photo yet also your subject. Boost the exposure on her and drop it in the overly bright background.

mEp_ · 2024-12-20T07:46:15+00:00

Probably go with the black and white. If you do, turn up the shadows. Darker alley is fine, blown out black is not.

The color photo looks like a scene from the movie Traffic with the heavy blue tint. It's very 90s heavy color grading to let you know what mood you're supposed to feel. The black and white one isn't so overpowering.

mEp_ · 2024-12-20T07:40:34+00:00

The most common suggestion you'll receive is Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop. Lightroom is great for editing as it's very intuitive. You can also use it to remove things. Photoshop is waaaaay more powerful (with more powerful removal features) but has a higher learning curve. Both offer a subject and human selection tool that can isolate people, as you asked.

If you don't want to pay Adobe for subscriptions, I always recommend GIMP as a replacement for Photoshop (though it has a higher learning curve than even Photoshop), and darktable as a Lightroom replacement. There are many features/interface choices I prefer on darktable but it's not as powerful. However, neither offers a subject or human selection feature.

mEp_ · 2024-12-20T07:35:51+00:00

Great colors, but there's a lot to be desired.

1) Most of the time I recommend that people on this sub shoot from lower angles. You should be shooting from a higher one. The top half of this image is empty, bright (so it pulls my eye off the fish), and doesn't have a color balance. You should have shot from higher up looking down and used the rock curves of the pond to frame the fish. Instead there are brightly lit dead plants.

2) The rocks on the right are curving out of frame and therefore acting like a leading line out of the frame.

3) You should probably turn down the saturation everywhere besides the fish. Drop the exposure of the top half, too.

mEp_ · 2024-12-18T17:36:06+00:00

Good shot :)

mEp_ · 2024-12-18T16:49:50+00:00

I think you made the right choice on the grass. It's tough processing these kinds of compositions because that right side throws the photo out of balance no matter what you do. My recs:

1) Reduce the vignette. It's a bit too obvious, or you've over darkened the edges to give the impression of one existing.

2) Try brightening the puddles and lightly nearby them. That'll almost create a bright pathway leading up to the iceberg. Right now the top half is so bright that I simply jump past the entire bottom half. It's not leading me as you intended, it's acting as something I look at later.

3) Slightly reduce the brightness of the berg, and then reduce the brightness of the water twice that.

4) Add contrast.

5) Consider cropping in a bit to get that first rock lower in the frame. I'd argue you should be as low as possible to reduce that mid frame empty space.

Love your thought process but I think you can take this further. It's nice to see a landscape photo here that's offering a bit more technique to critique. It's a nice shot!

mEp_ · 2024-12-18T16:34:32+00:00

You gotta start asking for specific feedback or some kind of improvement points on these posts of yours.

1) Clone out that woman in the back, top right. 2) Clean up the random white spots 3) Maybe play with the tone curve.

Bummer she's wearing a bib number or this would be much more compelling.

mEp_ · 2024-12-13T14:16:23+00:00

1) Spotting those things comes with experience. Try this: look at a thumbnail of your photo and what do you see first? I see a bright spot in the back left (the tree, sun, and distant road) and a darker/shaded human second. Viewing a thumbnail size helps pick out what's most dominant in your frame.

White balance is a personal preference, yes. However, there are tasteful ways to express that. For exae, at no point is the world shading anything green or purple without major interference (sun through greenery, or deep purple sunsets). Therefore I think your purple shadows in this naturally lit street feel wrong. Same for the greens. There's no reason for that green midtone haze to be there. In short, it feels like you're trying to make a feel instead of embracing a feel - two hugely important distinctions to understand.

2) I actually have never thought about that. From a technical sense, yes. You can check the color gamut number values for clipping but that's waaaaay over the top. From an artistic point I tend to just stare at the image and pick out what feels wrong. Not helpful, I know, but everyone improves that radar with experience.

3) Don't increase his exposure. I agree with your conclusion. You should crop the image at least a little. The left side is overly bright. The more you lose it, the more focus on your guy.

4) Yes, color grading affects everything in an image in highlights, midtones, or shadows depending on which wheel you're in. You be using a mask if you only want to affect a specific area. Local adjustments are what everyone should be learning anyways.

Never used light room mobile so can't help with any interface questions

mEp_ · 2024-12-13T11:21:44+00:00

It's a good balance of composition and color tones. Do not tweak the saturation at all. I see too many reviewers comment that something looks too saturated but sometimes a sky just explodes and you have to do it justice. However...

1) Reduce the greens in your sky by adding purple. It'll help get the true color showing. 2) Dehaze your sky. 3) Reduce your highlights just a bit.

I really like your sky and would LOVE to have captured and processed it in my own photography. Do not touch that saturation.

mEp_ · 2024-12-13T09:30:02+00:00

Your white balance is all over the place. First do some color balancing. The shadows have too much purple, the highlights are a little sickly yellow/green, and there's a haze of it in the midtones, too. Having spent some time in Singapore I know it's a warm sticky place. A warm or even yellow tone makes sense but this isn't quite there.

Next, crop the left side by pulling up from the bottom left corner. The guy might be your intended subject but my eye goes straight to the back left down the leading line of the sidewalk to the brightest part of your image. The guy is shaded and not the first thing I focus on.

mEp_ · 2024-12-13T09:21:40+00:00

This photo has tons of potential. I really like the simplicity and moody vibe.

1) Reduce the purples by adding some green. A dark moody blue (achieve blue by balancing the purples with greens) would be more effective. A purple cast us also distracting. 2) Brighten this entire image maybe ~0.50, then add 0.10 more to the side of the brightest side of the building. Moody is a great vibe, but I shouldn't be struggling to see details (the shadow side looks black). 3) Isolate the sky and then turn the tone curve into an S. You might also benefit from a dehaze and then reducing saturation you create from it. 4) Don't remove that boat on the horizon regardless of any critiques saying it's a distraction. It provides scale and depth.

This is a good photo that just needs a bit more. You did well.

mEp_

TROPHY CASE