A Few Shots.

rabbitinlights

After getting my 350D before Xmas I finally got some spare time lately to go take some shots, so I went for a cycle yesterday around Galway and heres a few.
What do you think? I know sunsets are 10 a penny but let rip and let me know how to improve them!! Im going to get a gradient filter soon to help.








The above were taken near Blackrock in Salthill.




These are crops of much larger pictures. Do you think they are too tight?



Thanks for looking

Sean.

Howitzer

what times optical zoom were you on for the birds? how close were you to them? would like an eos cam. Does the lens that comes with give good mag?

I think your shots are good. Not burnt out by the sun. Backgrounds nicely out of focus on the bird shots.
The sunset photos might be missing a focal point in them, like a wrecked boat or something. but sometimes there just isn't one present to shoot. Good practice for when there is.

Did you have to photoshop the sunset ones much? Just levels i guess.

Nice work

Fenster

Haha, those were taken at Blackrock, were they not? I epsecially liked shot #3, from down on the beach.

Shrimp

Why do those two birds only have one leg each?

rabbitinlights

Thanks for the replys:

@ Fenster: Yup, Blackrock. some taken from the diving board and some behind the wall on the beach. I really think a gradient grey filter would have helped with the 3rd shot, giving more detail of the beach.

@ Shrimp, Its the way they stand I think. I didnt actually notice it till after I got home, It was actually a shot of the river corrib and they were in the outer part of the shot. (thats why the focus is a little soft)

@Howitzer, it was @ 85mm on the 17-85mm Canon lense. I dont actually have the kit lense, but its ment to be great value for the extra few quid over the body. The shot is cropped from a larger shot though. None of the shots have been touched in Photoshop. (Im pretty retarded as photoshop goes as of yet.) The beach ones were the best out of about 50 that I took just going through most of the settings seeing what they looked like.

Any good/bad points that could help the next time?

Carrigman

All the sunset shots have a common fault: the horizon is not level - it is tilting badly to the right. That is something that can easily be fixed in Photoshop.

Howitzer

quickest bit of photoshoppery for you: ctrl+L for 'levels'
Hit auto and see what happens. It can lift some of the shots.
Sometimes it wont do anything -- I feel that is a well exposed shot as it doesn't need correction.

rabbitinlights

Ye, I noticed the horizons alright, I tried to use Picasa2 to fix it but when I save if after the quality of the shot is terrible? ( I have the quality @ 100%)

How do you do it in photoshop?

Sean.

Thanks for the tip Howitzer!

Fajitas!

I think some of the sun shots could be cropped alot more, even to give a more panaramic look. As you mentioned, sunsets are 10 a penny, but try make yours look that bit different.

rabbitinlights

Thanks Fajitas!, I cropped a huge amount off the first picture above and did the auto levels in photoshop:




Sean.

Flipflip

rabbitinlights wrote:

Ye, I noticed the horizons alright, I tried to use Picasa2 to fix it but when I save if after the quality of the shot is terrible? ( I have the quality @ 100%)

How do you do it in photoshop?

Sean.

Thanks for the tip Howitzer!

Select the crop tool.

Select the area u wish to crop. if u dont want to crop any then select the entire image. then move your mouse outside of the crop border and itll turn to a kinda twisty arrow thing. that will allow you to roatte the picture to an even level.

hope that helps!