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No offense to the girl, but I think I'd like this better if she weren't standing there. But then, I'm a sucker for old architecture B&W's. I guess I can't figure out whether your subject is the girl or the barn, and they're both losing that competition. Perhaps if the barn were out of focus and smaller (wider lens?), this would be a better portrait.

I love all the texture and contrast in those clouds. I've been waiting a while to be able to capture an incoming wall cloud like that in one of the numerous storms we have around Nebraska. No luck yet.

After the tornado sirens stopped, the most incredible lightning storm

ensued. No wind, no rain, and non-stop cloud-to-cloud bolts.

 

I've posted three photos from this storm in my "Sky" portfolio. All

had the contrast stretched to accentuate the lighting on the clouds.

Coloration was done solely by modifying the white balance. The

red-ish shots use a higher color temp (~8700K) than the blue-ish shot

(~5500K). I prefer the blue-ish one, but most people seem to prefer

the red-ish color. What do you think? Anything else I can do to

improve my shots during the next storm? Getting enough light on the

clouds while keeping the shutter slow enough to stop their motion is

tough.

I would have preferred that the focus plane be a touch farther back,

where the stem meets the head. Oh well. I was shooting "from the

hip," with the camera buried in a flower bed at arm's reach. What do

you think about the aperture? Too large? Too narrow?

Wow. This is the kind of image that steps out from around a street corner, punches you in the chest, and then stands there, staring, waiting to see how you'll react.

 

When I saw the thumbnail, I figured it was a van Gogh style distortion of a family snapshot.

 

I agree with some that say it feels off balance. I think it'd be better if the center child was a bit farther off to the right. I was going to suggest that perhaps you might have moved a few inches to your right, then angled back some toward the left. However, I'd hate to lose those other kids looking in through the window, and I might not want to see whoever Mom is looking at, so perhaps your angle is the best that was available.

 

I do love the lighting and exposure. I also like that the left child's face is only half shown. We get enough to see that it's distorted somewhat, but little enough to keep us wanting to see more in order to finish the story.

 

Well done.

I like the idea and the various expressions. What I don't care for is the B&W treatment on the upper right & lower left photos. With her (comparatively) dark skin and light hat, there's not enough contrast to make the B&W versions interesting, and you're losing those wonderfully rich colors that the two color photos possess.

Wow, 60 seconds after posting, I've already got an anonymous 4/4 rating. At least it's not 3/3...

From the same shoot as "Long Ride Home." I love shooting close-ups

like this. My Sigma 17-70 macro lens is well worth the money.

We usually return home from church at my 18-month-old son's nap time.

Easter Sunday was no exception. He looked so cute, and the light

coming in through the open truck doors was so good that I just

couldn't pass up a photo session before bringing him in to bed. I

bumped the contrast somewhat and applied an orange filter to further

darken his blue car seat and green pacifier.

I like the visual patterns here. However, I think you've pushed too much of your range up toward white, so the top half (and the highlights on the chairs) looks more like a pen-and-ink drawing than a photo. Pulling them back down into the grey range would add more depth to the photo.

 

I also found myself bored in an airport a couple weeks ago and snapped a few B&W shots (similar in mood to yours) with my P&S camera (all I had with me). One of them turned out reasonably well, but I don't have it online yet to share...

I really like this photo. It really epitomizes the family event (grandma's birthday?). The exposure is spot on. The layout may have been better if you'd taken half a step to your right so the folks on the left weren't so hidden.

 

I'd love to know how you managed this shot. It appears that the candles provide the only significant lighting in the room, yet there's no motion blur in your subjects and (at this resolution) no significant high-ISO grain noise. You shot with a 50/1.4, but given the level of focus on the rear-most man, it appears that you were nowhere near f/1.4 for this shot. Did you severely under expose at the time and then pull it back up in postprocessing?

Very fun shot! I love all the colors (although the right side is a little dark). The timing of the jump is perfect. What lens did you use?

Nice shot. I love cranes, and often visit go see them when they stop over in central Nebraska each spring. I love the way you've captured this group. They almost look like they're hurdling that yellow tree, which also provides a nice color point. Excellent sharpness on the cranes, too. I'd like to see the technical specs on this shot and know what you shot it with.

Perfect exposure, and the shutter speed works well. I love night scenes, and this one is very well done.

I have to give you props just for highlighting an old CJ-2A on PN. I like the perspective, too.

I'm a fan of contrasty B&W photos, which is why this one caught my eye, but I think you went a little overboard on the contrast. There's too much black and not enough grey shades, IMHO. The sky isn't so bad, but the lower half looks more like an etched lithograph than a photo.

 

I also think that the line between the water and grass is too close to center, which gives it the feel of two separate images pasted together. I tried cropping up from the bottom, but catching only the tips of the grass looked like something was missing. Perhaps moving a few steps to the right & forward so that other clump of grass was in front of you would allow you to move closer to the grass and lower the dividing line without feeling like you're only catching the tops of the grass.

Wandering the main street of Estes Park, CO, after dark, my daughter

was enamored with all the candy vendors. I wish I had panned downward

a bit and focused closer (on her face), but I had only a split second

to manually focus and frame the shot before she turned away, so this

is what I got.

I like the composition. You don't see to many B&W shots of jelly fish. This one could use more contrast, though -- at least at the high end.

While waiting for my wife at a gas station near Golden, CO, mydaughter wandered across the street to photograph a calf. Somethingdistracted her momentarily.

This is the second in a series of B&W photos (mostly of my family)where I was playing with contrast and exposure. I'd appreciate anyconstructive criticism.

This is the first of a series of B&W photos (probably all taken of my

family) in which I've been using postprocessing to play with exposure

and contrast. I'm fairly new at this, and would appreciate any

constructive criticism.