# First Shoots, Yeah I am new to this



## Coldow91 (Sep 14, 2007)

Yes there is a typo in the title but I dont know how to change it


Here are my first landscape attempts (i hope that the images work and the size is alright)

Comments and tips will be appreciated and keep in mind I am new to photography.



















Also I have done nothing but crop these photos, If you had some tips on how to touch them up in Photoshop I could give that a shot.


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## AbelR74 (Sep 14, 2007)

Hi, welcome to the forums!
I really like the composition of your first shot; I just wish the brightness/contrast was touched up a bit.  Looks like a cloud went right over you and brought you in darkness, so to speak..
I wonder if you could have zoomed in more on the bridge; seems like some dead space at the bottom of this picture.
I also like the composition of your third photo; just that it also seems a little dark but with a slight haze in the sky.  Was it midday?
So far, I see you have a good eye and just need to keep snapping them pictures and learn from them...
Thanks for sharing...


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## Coldow91 (Sep 14, 2007)

Ok, thanks a lot for the comments and tips. I still have to upload and find a lot more of my pictures so I will be posting more.

Could brightness/contrast be touched up in photoshop?
Is there any good way to get rid of the haze, without going back to Wales?

Thanks again


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## Coldow91 (Sep 14, 2007)

I tried messing with it, but I am not really experienced with photo-touch-up in photoshop


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## GrfxGuru (Sep 14, 2007)

Hi and welcome. 

I love the look and feel of #3, the shadows from the clouds helps to bring out the scale I think.

Regards,
Peter Witham


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## Coldow91 (Sep 14, 2007)

Thanks!


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## Sweetsomedays (Sep 14, 2007)

The edit is much better IMHO. I like your pictures...they have demension and texture to them  I hope that makes sense. It kinda feels like I am looking out a window at a view instead of at a flat image. 
My only issue as others have said a bit dark in 1-2 but thats what PS is for.


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## Coldow91 (Sep 17, 2007)

Here is another edit of the first one.






What do you think of it now.


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## kundalini (Sep 17, 2007)

Coldow91 said:


> Here is another edit of the first one.


 
Somewhere in between.  The second one is too grey IMO.

On the second one of the bridge, I like the composition.  If you have them, try an ND or preferably Polarizer filter.


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## Keith Gebhardt (Sep 18, 2007)

try this. Google proper adjustment tech. pay attention to color balance, curves.. learn what midtones, highlights, and shawdows do, learn to use diffrent filters. When your taking your photo also look at your lcd, but dont only rely on it. Switch it up to see the histogram and make sure your RGB and White Balance are correct. Another thing. Use tripod.. your trees are a bit blurry. Not to bad though. Pretty good composition. I also like the last one you posted. Maybe brighten it up a little bit, but comp is good, i like how you set the horizon more towards the top then the bottom to get the whole valley. your second photos lighting is great. comp is ok, and a nitpick is the road on the left. could have done with out it. Over all.. nice shots. just learn some more of the easy stuff to touch them up to be beautiful


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## Coldow91 (Sep 18, 2007)

Yeah thanks, the field picture was taken in hand from a stopped car, so not ideal conditions but I understand what you mean. I used to be always taking "snapshots", but now I am thinking how to set up things in the photo, how to work with the lighting etc. but I am still learning

When I took these pictures I was trying to take good photos, but I did not understand about what makes a good picture  (lighting, composition, etc). But thanks to this forum and books I have learned a lot and my photos have improved.


I am also just learning about post processing and will google "proper adjustment tech." and hope to learn more about it.

Thanks for all the helpful comments, this forum has really helped me!!!! (look forward to some new pictures up in the next week)


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## Keith Gebhardt (Sep 18, 2007)

Anytime man. Just remember. 
Composition 
Lighting 
Technical Aspects

And youll be fine. Once you learn the 3 main elements to make a great picture, youll continually progress. Practice shots with bright colors, practice low light. Practice Depth of field. Learn What and how shutter speeds, aperatures (f./ stop #), and iso (film speed) do and affect your photographs. My best advice, everytime you take a picture, write down in a notebook the settings you used. and when you veiw the pictures, see what settings you used. see what the picture looked like. and adjust to what you think will make it better. go out and reshoot.


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## Coldow91 (Sep 18, 2007)

Sounds like a great idea, and a good way to progress. 

Thanks a lot!!


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## BoblyBill (Sep 20, 2007)

This one is absolutely crazy awesome picture. The composition on this one is perfect. All I did was add a little contrast.


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## Coldow91 (Sep 20, 2007)

Thanks BoblyBill. I like it better with more contrast. When I saw the winding river leading into the ocean on a hike and thought it would make a great subject.


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## 93rdcurrent (Sep 20, 2007)

Here's what less than 10 min can do with Photoshop CS3
*raised Saturation
*raised Hue
*Brought up Yellow, Red, Green in Midtones
*Brought up Yellow, Red in Highlights
*Brought up Blue, Green in Shadows
*Raised the brightness/Contrast both
*Played with the Curves bringing up the low end and lower the high end so that you have brigther landscape and brought the darkness back to the clouds after brightening up the image... just some ideas.


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## Coldow91 (Sep 20, 2007)

thanks 93rd I love it. I will keep in mind the changes you made for future projects/pictures.


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## 93rdcurrent (Sep 20, 2007)

Coldow91 said:


> thanks 93rd I love it. I will keep in mind the changes you made for future projects/pictures.


Great shots I just think that with the right editing you can bring out the aspects that the exposure and lighting conditions were letting you down on. Do you have PS CS3 yet? If you don't you will find that it is a good investment especially with digital images.


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## Coldow91 (Sep 20, 2007)

I have CS2 but am not used to post processing images with it.

here is another picture. Comments and tips on how "I" can post process this so I can learn would be appreciated


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## 93rdcurrent (Sep 20, 2007)

My recommendation is to start with the _Image_ tab and go down to _Adjustments._ From there you will have the main features to edit with. Play around with _Brightness/Contrast, Color Balance,_ and _Hue/Saturation _to begin with. Also if you set your camera to originally store the image in Raw format you can also play around with _White Balance, Clarity, Exposure, _etc. when you import the image from Adobe Browser over to Photoshop. Really I'm still learning too. I just decided to jump in and start editing and took note of what I liked and what was working. Have fun! 

I would like to see more detail in the clouds in the background. Play around with the saturation too because it would look a little warmer with more vibrant color. I would also look at playing with the highlights to get more yellow and red to soften up the strength of the white.


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## Coldow91 (Sep 20, 2007)

ok thanks again I will try some things out


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## Coldow91 (Sep 20, 2007)

here is my first shot at it. I probably try different variations when I have time


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## RKW3 (Sep 20, 2007)

^ Watch out, don't make the sky blown out.


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## Coldow91 (Sep 20, 2007)

Yeah as I said I will try again but thanks for the tip!!


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## Keith Gebhardt (Sep 20, 2007)

ok.. 1st of all. never edit your image in RGB. Go to IMAGE>MODE>LAB COLOR. Then IMAGE>ADJUSTMENTS>LEVELS. There should be an equal balance in the histogram. Move your black and white tabs till you find what your looking for *be careful not to under, or over expose your image. remember your trying to make it better.

2nd of all, curves.. take the black dropper, and click the darkest point on the image, white dropper (clear) click on the brightest point on the image. Do that for every color layer given for LAB COLOR mode. Your image will come out alot better.

heres a good tutorial if you need help.





And for histograms





Watch them! And Learn!


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## Unmanedpilot (Sep 21, 2007)

Since everyone seems to like posting their edits thought I would share mine as well.






What I did was edit it in 3 different parts.  Anyone who has messed with the brightness and contrast in PS noticed the clouds turn pure white fast. So what you need to do is edit it so that you like the ground then put a layer mask on and put the sky back to its original color by basically deleting it in the layer you edited. Then I proceeded to edit the sky in the same manor on a new layer (didn't do much).  After this I made a new adjustment layer and edited the back hill so it wasn't so foggy. There are tutorials out there if you look to find out more specifically as I cant really describe exactly what I did.  If you ask though I will try and describe in a more detailed fashion. :mrgreen:   Anyway this edit isn't perfect but it enhances the original a bit I think.

Edit: oh yea, also did a minor unsharp mask to, well sharpen it a bit.


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