Sunrise in NW Montana

i took this shot just at sunrise with a D 3100. f/36, 1/30 sec with an iso of 100. still playing with manual mode. Thanks.

i havent received any critique on this photo. is this not working on this site?

I like it but i wonder if the sun flare does not over whelm it to some degree. But the ground fog in the trees is pretty cool.

I love it! The only thing i might say is the large foreground kind of distracts from the interesting part of the composition.

It needs some work. More detail in the foreground and a little more contrast in the clouds. Also the horizon it dead center. need to look at the rule of thirds.

thanks for all the comments. i am still learning alot. Don, what did you do to lighten it up? i havent edited the photo at all but i like what you did.

Randy can you explain in more detail? i am a total rookie and not sure what you mean.

Like what Don did with your photo. Now the foreground has interest. And a little less foreground, too.

When shooting a photo we generally break it up into thirds. If you are showing the sky then one third foreground and the two thirds sky. Conversely, if we are showing the ground as the point of interest then one third sky. We try to avoid splitting 50/50. In your original photo your horizon is nearly running through the middle.


In Don's edit he brought up the shadows so they weren't so dark and cropped the photo placing the foreground as one third and the distant backdrop and sky as two thirds. This did away with some of the uninteresting grassy area and gives more prominence to the distant mountains, clouds, fog, and the sun.


As a general rule, and knowing when to break the rule is also key, we try to break an image into thirds as well as place points of interest at the intersecting lines. Sometimes we want to break the rule for a certain effect, but when in doubt... try to see the thirds in your minds eye as you frame your shot.

Finally, editing is your best friend with digital images. Shoot the best image you can and then tweak.

Welcome to the site.

Moab, thank you for explaining this! this kind of criticism is what i was hoping for on this site. i can read all i want to but until i actually take some photos and have others more knowledgable break it down like you did i wont learn a thing. the morning i took this shot i think i finally somewhat understood "creative exposure". all morning i was taking shots as the sun came up but none looked good so i put my camera in fully manual mode and would change a setting then click a shot. this shot was severely underexposed according the the meter on my camera but it turned out the best.

You're welcome. Light metering on the camera is merely a suggestion and is easily thrown off. A prominent amount of white will trick the camera into thinking there is too much light and the opposite if you have a lot of dark colors. Or if you're trying to produce a certain mood. The camera is always trying to achieve a specific level of exposure.

Assuming you are shooting in raw. Pick a particular light choice, say full sunlight setting, and shoot all the images in that white balance regardless of what the sun rise or set is doing. If you set it to auto white balance the camera is going to keep changing trying to compensate for what doesn't makes sense to the camera. That is why many cameras have a sunrise/set mode to counter the shifting color temperature. Then when you edit you can dial them all in to the color temperature you like.

You also want to be full manual. If you're in shutter priority or aperture the camera is going to make other adjustments to the camera to bring the lighting up to full daylight thus losing what you're going after.

Lastly, the help and knowledge on here is phenomenal. Where people have difficulty is when they ask a question, but don't really want to listen to the answer. For instance, sometimes people will ask what they could have done better or for some guidance. They get replies giving them advice and the recipient of the advice does nothing but argue for what it was they did instead of trying to understand how the suggestions could help their image. However, that is not what you did... you asked questions and listened. For that reason, I think you will make a great addition here on the forum and wait until you look back on this picture one year from now and have a laugh at how far you've come.

Again, welcome and keep shooting.

thanks so much for that whole thing you just said Moab Man! i know and understand i have ALOT to learn and i just dont learn as fast now that i am older, lol. i am shooting with my camera set to save raw and jpeg both. i am not sure what i had the white balance set to so i bet it was on auto. next time i go out i will def change that. i do have adobe photoshop elements 11 and lightroom 4 but havent used either much yet. hopefully this weekend i can get out again and try some more low light shots. i really enjoy the serenity of the early morning shots. i am also interested in star shots and have taken a few again playing and learning what settings do what. i will try to post many more pictures on here for more suggestions from everyone and specially you. i think you do an awesome job explaining what you are saying and showing the images divided like that did more than words ever could.

Montana Michael said:

i just dont learn as fast now that i am older, lol.

Click to expand...

May be true, but I still bet you learn faster now because your at an age, as am I, that we have figured out what the ears on the side of our heads are for. I'm often telling my class, "You have two ears and one mouth for a reason. Use them that way - listen twice as much as you speak and you'll learn more because you won't be talking over the information you should be hearing."

Being that you're in Montana you should have some excellent opportunities to shoot stars. You should add your equipment to your signature (it's in your profile) so we can see what all you're working with.

here is a shot of my girlfriend taken sunday and edited with what i hope i have learned from above posts.

Much better. Keep shooting.

woohoo! my original photo was used on a local tv station and posted on their facebook page as well! if i had only done the edits to it like Don and Moab Man had shown me first..........


https://www.facebook.com/KCFW9?fref=nf