# My Photography; Need Advice



## bvjgcigh (Oct 19, 2013)

Bera's Pictures
I created this blog to display my photographs a while back. I think I need advice on the pictures I post on it and just the overall display. Any advice would be nice. Also, I really can't think of much to write about my pictures- should I even write anything? Is a blog even a good way to display my photographs. Thanks!

-Bera


Note: Most of the images have an artistic feel (not meant to look correct). All of my images were taken with a Canon t3/1100d (kit lens and an ef 75-300mm).


----------



## peter27 (Oct 20, 2013)

Why don't you post one or two in the galleries here? If you say a little about the photos when posting: what your settings were, what you were going for in the shot, and what it is about them that you're not sure about for example, then you'll get some advice and guidance from this forum. It's also okay to post them without saying anything, but fewer people will respond then because they might think you only want comments if they see something they really like or if there is something quite obviously askew that they think you've overseen.


----------



## PJL (Oct 20, 2013)

"Artistic feel" just comes across as laziness when the horizons of your landscape shots are consistently slightly off level. I personally would rather see a genuinely interesting "correct" landscape shot.  The bridge and the highway shots are nice, but the obvious tilt is distracting.


----------



## limr (Oct 20, 2013)

PJL said:


> "Artistic feel" just comes across as laziness when the horizons of your landscape shots are consistently slightly off level. I personally would rather see a genuinely interesting "correct" landscape shot.  The bridge and the highway shots are nice, but the obvious tilt is distracting.



I have to agree. "Artistic" does not mean the same as "no technique." A lot of the shots I saw on the blog didn't feel "not correct in an artistic way" and more simply "not correct." For example, there was a shot that you called "A dark and cozy room" The picture, however, just seemed very underexposed for no specific reason (i.e. to get a silhouette.) 

I'd suggest paying more attention to composition and techniques for isolating the subjects of the photos, and then worry about trying to make them more "artistic."


----------



## vintagesnaps (Oct 20, 2013)

I don't think a blog necessarily has to be a lot of writing and could be more visual. Your photos seem to show that you're seeing interesting things. 

I like the Triangle forest, and A Walk is an interesting idea. You might want to think about your framing, and making sure you're getting a proper exposure. You have some nice scenes photographed that might benefit from some adjustment, as mentioned with some you might think about the perspective and straightening or cropping as needed; some seem rather dark and might need to be brightened or the contrast adjusted. I find that if I get my photo framed the way I want it, with the subject in my viewfinder the way I want it, and get a proper exposure, then I can end up with a good photograph.

I think it works to learn good techniques and then experiment from there; if you are thinking in terms of artistic maybe think about what type of artistic technique or look you're going for.


----------



## The_Traveler (Oct 20, 2013)

Dump that background, it is totally distracting and certainly reduces your images.
The images are way too small, link to bigger versions.

Sorry, they do link but it was just very slow to load.


----------



## bvjgcigh (Oct 20, 2013)

Alright thanks a lot for the advice! This was just what I was looking for!


----------



## bvjgcigh (Oct 20, 2013)

I sort of did agree with you on the background from the start, but what should I put there instead?


----------



## bvjgcigh (Oct 20, 2013)

From the looks of things, I need to get more proper exposure and I need to focus much more on composing my shots correctly. Does anyone think the incorrect white-balances were throwing people off or ruining the pictures in any way?


----------



## bvjgcigh (Oct 21, 2013)

So I tried recomposing two of the shots in my image editor to fit the rule of thirds more. Did it get any better? I should have composed the shots while I were taking them in the first place, but would this do for now? View attachment 58551Also, the hill in the front of the first image is really dark- I can't seem to find a way to fix it through the curves. Is there something i'm missing (both these were originally shot in raw).View attachment 58552


----------



## limr (Oct 21, 2013)

bvjgcigh said:


> I sort of did agree with you on the background from the start, but what should I put there instead?



I would suggest a solid color, preferably something dark. I don't know what kind of options Blogger gives you for customization or if they have some photo-specific themes available. I also want to ask - do you resize the pictures before posting them? If not, you might consider doing so. Maybe it's just my computer, but your page takes forever to load.

I like the first edit you made. What photo editor are you using? I don't generally do a lot of post processing, so someone else will be better to advise you on that, but you might want to mention the name of the program so we all know what you're working with.


----------



## bvjgcigh (Oct 21, 2013)

I think the page takes ages to load because I have too many images per page (I should cut it down and spread them out on more pages). 
I'm using RawTherapee 4.0 simply because its free and open source. It, of course, has its limits because its free, but it works for me and gets the job done. Its a great alternative for Adobe's Lightroom if you want to save some money.


----------



## limr (Oct 22, 2013)

I don't know anything about that program. I know Gimp is also free and many people here use it. You might want to check it out to see if it gives you more options than Raw Therapee.


----------



## bvjgcigh (Oct 22, 2013)

I have gimp too, but I stopped using it because it couldn't process raw images- otherwise its awesome and has much more features.


----------

