Peeking Over the Horizon

Any thoughts or comments are greatly appreciated!

I'm still trying to work on finding new compositions for this lighthouse at sunrise. The extreme low tide was a nice touch because I was able to fill the foreground with little tide pools and mud. My previous post from SAT morning (Daybreak Solitude) has a lot of empty space and few points of interest. The sky was void of clouds so the right side of the shot seemed barren to me. I took the good points of that shot (mainly the foreground mud and water) and tried to add a little interest to the right side by positioning myself so the sun would balance the image a bit. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this composition or any alternate ideas you may have. Thanks for stopping by!

correcting the unlevel horizon would help a lot

The colors are absolutly beautiful and the lighthouse makes a nice silhouette. Unfortunately the horizon is leaning a little.

/Rasmus

Perfect composition, colors and mood!

Thanks for the comments--I do appreciate them. As for the horizon, I initially thought the same thing but look a bit closer--the *horizon* is actually not crooked. Don't look at the land...that is an island and it is irregularly shaped so gives the appearance or being unlevel. BUT, if you look at the sun--it is cut in half by the TRUE horizon, which is the water in the distance beyond the island. Look at the water line and you'll see that it does not parallel the land of the island and is straight as an arrow! I do understand why you guys thought that though--as I said, I thought the same thing...it's just a bit of an illusion because of the fact that we are looking at water, an island, and then ocean on the far side. Thanks again for the kind remarks!

Here is a comment that was posted before I reuploaded this picture for critique:

 

Stephen Penland, March 26, 2007; 12:09 A.M.

 

The addition of the sun and the patches of bright clouds really contribute a lot. I wish, however, that the foreground mud was in focus. To my eye, the blur makes it distracting. How about trying a focus spot and aperture similar to your previous shot?

 

Stephen--Thank you for your comment. My aperture here is shut down as far as it can go (I think f/32) in order to try to get maximum DOF but I agree, the foreground is a little blurry. It is definitely possible that my focal point was off...I was trying to focus far enough in the distance to make sure my DOF would go to infinity to get the lighthouse and sun in decent focus but maybe I over compensated. I have shut down so far in order to 1) blue the water and get as much reflection as possible and 2) get maximum DOF. Where would you suggest that I focus if I had this same composition again? I'm shooting at 75mm here and I'm worried that if I focus on the mud specifically that my DOF would fall short of the island and lighthouse--I'll have to go to dofmaster.com and do some calculations. One more thing, I'll try to post another version later but I think my filter for this shot may have something to do with the blur as well. They kept fogging up with condensation and I had to continuously wipe them down so I'm wondering if there was condensation or streak marks that may have contributed to the problem. The surrounding frames with no/different filters look a TOUCH better to me, but I'm not an expert on seeing this type of stuff. Thanks again for your comments--if you have any suggestions for focal point, f/stop, etc. I would love hear them and will definitely give them a go next time out!

Tyler

I like your composition but the above comment I believe is correct. The horizontal plane is running down hill. In other words in the real world the water would run out of the frame if you know what I mean. I'll post a straight horizontal of your posting above. You will notice the sun and the ocean are also horizontal.

Best regards

Jim

Jim--Thanks for your comments. I will take your word (and the word of those above) about the horizon but it's still a bit confusing to me. It looks like to the left of the image the land is the horizon but to the right side of the image the horizon is not the land, but rather a wedge of ocean water that gets progressively bigger and bigger as you go further right. If that is the case, then leveling the land will slant the ocean water. That was my thinking but in the end I probably trust you guys more than myself. :) I agree that your repost (thanks, by the way) does look nice. Upon reconsideration I guess I would say that there is a mild tilt which is exacerbated by the island/ocean alignment I mentioned above.

 

I would tend to agree there is a true tilt in this shot but another reason I'm always told pictures of this lighthouse are tilted is because the lighthouse really, truly is FALLING! So, the lighthouse is definitely not horizontal...I'd say it probably leans about 4 degrees or so (see my picture "White Caps"--the B&W shot with the wave crashing...it looks REALLY tilted in that picture but some people confirmed that the horizon was flat so it's really the lighthouse).

 

Once again, thanks for your comments on my composition and repost. You have shown me that while I may have a point about the island creating a bit of an illusion, there also seems to be a slight tilt that you kindly corrected.

 

PS-I clicked quickly on your portfolio and you have some great shots upon quick scan. I'm studying for my medical board exam this week but I'll be sure to come by and leave some comments to return the critiquing favor after the exam. I do appreciate you stopping by and offering your thoughts.

Tyler

Good luck with your medical board exams. When you get a chance you know you can edit your posting and replace it here without erasing it. Go to "options/Edit Image Info" under you photo and upload the corrected file.

Jim

Thanks Jim! I appreciate your help, comments, and good luck wishes. I'll be by to comment on some of your shots soon.

Yup - that good old crooked horizon stuff will get ya every time. I find it especially easy to correct if there is a vertical object in the shot - such as your lighthouse - You can see it's not parallel to the edge of the picture frame so that would be a sure indiciation. Fence posts work or edges of buildings, lamposts etc. But that only works if you've taken the shot straight on like this one. Some people have mentioned the fuzzy foreground. I would prefer none of that muddy foreground at all and would have cropped it out entirely for a clean "glassy" shot. The lighthouse and sun and strip of land all on the same plane lend a really graphic quality to the image and I find the foreground stuff just muddies it up. But personal taste only. I guess you've had it with people picking apart your image. I hope you realize that people only do that if they really like the picture. Otherwise they don't bother. AT least that's the case with me. So please take no offense - it is a fantastic image - really good exposure. It's not a moon shot but it's darn pretty!

Tyler

 

This is a great shot. I do agree that the horizon is not level. You can easily correct this in photoshop.

 

By the way, you should never stop down your lens to the smallest aperture; you lose sharpness due to diffraction. You probably would get great results with F16 or 12. I think this shot could have done without the foreground. Still, it's a great one!

 

Good luck with the boards!

 

Yinka