landscapes Thoughts ?

Please click for a larger view. I am stuck on which direction to go

with this image. Suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

Paul, I think I'd go with the Goldilocks approach (in the middle, not too light and not too dark).  However, my biggest "issue" is understanding what I'm seeing.  The black appears to be a storm cloud dropping a ton of rain, but I don't understand the white that it's falling into (another layer of clouds, perhaps?).  It's hard for me to get a sense of scale, or of distance.  The B&W is dramatic, and you must have been thrilled to have a small, single cloud pass by at the top in front of all this.

Stephen. I think you nailed why I can't decide what direction to go in. There are all kinds of very cool things going on in this image, and I haven't moved anything around or added anything. That little cloud was there and in the far distance it was not raining, nor on me either. Maybe as natural as the situation was, it doesn't look natural. Be curious if others make a similar observation. By the way I am heading over to this lake next week to fish. You still in Utah? It must be stunning all in bloom. Got to get down there next spring.

Paul, what do you want the photograph to convey? How did you feel, how did you understand what was in front of your camera at the moment you decided to take a photograph? What can you do to enhance that feeling in your photograph?

You have two alternatives: you can print and present following the arbitrary “rules,” no blown whites, no plugged blacks, or you can print and present to display your personal experience.

What you have photographed seems a very impressive occurrence, something that would be very effecting to anyone that witnessed it. If you were awestruck, as it seems one would be, was your reaction deep and foreboding in its power, were you overwhelmed with its awesomeness, or was it light and uplifting in its majesty? What was it in front of you that was the most amazing to you? Whatever that was, that is what you want to put the emphasis on in your photograph if you wish to convey that to the viewer.

There is considerable ambiguity in your photograph. At first it seemed a turbulent ocean during a storm. There is great movement in the upper part of the image, turbulence, chaos. Then in the lower part there is calmness. There is considerable metaphor that can be read into the image. The contrast of turbulence and calmness, darkness and lightness and then that is heavily punctuated by the white cloud that could be read as representative of something spiritual or at least bordering on spiritual.

On closer look the squareness of the light area on the left combined with the calm in what appears to be water in the foreground suggest more a rushing waterfalls than an ocean.

I really don’t want to tell you how to present your photograph but I do have to ask if darkening the near foreground would not unite the upper and lower portions of your image better regardless whether you go with the lighter or darker version.

Have to smile. I just read your reply to Stephen mentioning that this is a lake. Wow. I don't think we lakes like that in Texas. Yelp, ambiguity.

Wow, thank you Gary for so much thoughtful and helpful comment. Your are right, you don't have lakes like this in Texas....at least not that I have seen. It was all a problem of me trying to figure out what I wanted to say with this photograph, not whether it needed to be darker of lighter, etc. Once I realized why I was so drawn to it after three years I knew exactly what to do with it. Click the left arrow to see where I finally landed.  Thanks again.

... but even after staring at it for a few minutes now, going back and forth between the previous image, enlarging this one, looking at all three side-by-side, I am distracted by the tilted horizon. Everything seems to slide to the right.

I prefer the tonality of the center image, though I would probably experiment with the darkness of the cliffs etc. as well. I like the drama of the darkened sky, though it clashes with the calm foreground and might be a bit overdone, similar to Ansel Adam's choice of red filters (which i liked a lot at one point). The lighter version overexposes the far distant clouds too much, so the center seems "just right". If it was my image I'd go with the center one, straighten it,  crop the foreground (I am a sucker for big skies) and slightly lighten the foremost cliff on the right.

But you decide! You're the one who's seen it and has an idea of what you'd like to express. All the rest of us are just going for show. Great image either way!

Thanks Chris for the in depth review. If you click the let arrow you will see where I landed. I really had not noticed the tilted horizon, but I will straighten it to see if the image still says want I want.