Your photos (147) |
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 Hints and tips by Philip Grosset If you'd like to submit photos for criticism, click here. |
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with comments from Philip Grosset "This picture was taken in Imperial Beach, San Diego. It's the most southwesterly city in the Continental US, just to clear up the location. The big circle thing in the photo is some military thing. My name is Megan McArthur and I am from San Diego, CA. Thanks for taking your time to look at this. Meg" |
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| Your photo on the left could be made slightly more dramatic by coming in closer, as I have done on the right. This way, I'm concentrating attention on what looks the most interesting part of the picture. This is the Imperial Beach Pier in San Diego California. The sunset was really pretty and all I had was black and white film, but I think it turned out pretty nice. Can you give me some constructive criticism yah? Thanks." (Megan McArthur, San Diego CA) |
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| I like the dramatic sky in your photo on the left, but the pier is too far away to be seen at all clearly, so on the right I have again tried moving closer in. This also reduces the rather overwhelming dark area at the foot of the picture, and avoids letting the horizon come exactly halfway up so that it splits the picture in two. "Ok, this picture is the sunset over the Old cemetery in Riverside County, CA. We were just checking out the cemetery and the sunset surprised us. What do ya think?" (Megan McArthur, San Diego CA) |
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| It seems a pity that there's nothing here to show that it is an old cemetery. There's a building hidden halfway across the picture but you'd have needed a longer exposure to reveal it. Without it, there's not really all that much to see. The sunset itself is fine, but some more interesting silhouettes would have added to its appeal (see my page of sunset photos). | |||||||||||||||||||
"This is just a little piece of the waves washing up onto the shore in Imperial Beach, CA." (Megan McArthur, San Diego CA) |
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| Your photo on the left is a bit dark, so, on the right, I've lightened it, and moved in so as to feature the footprint more strongly. I've also removed the round mark beween it and the sea, as it looks more mysterious when seen in isolation! It gains too from no longer being absolutely central in the picture.
Reply from Megan McArthur: "Thanks for the tips. Ya know what is kinda funny is that I just barely got my new camera about 2 weeks ago, and the one that I took all those photos with was a Kodak APS camera. So I was pretty impressed with those, from that camera. Maybe I can submit some more in a while from my new camera. But anyways, I agree with you on all of those. Thanks a whole bunch. And dude, however did you get back that fast. It was crazy great. Seriously. And your site, WOW. I learned so much, it just made me want to hop outside and go take tons of photos. Thanks a bunch and I will be keepin up with your site always." |
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| Both your photos would benefit from interesting foreground framing, as explained on my Landscapes and Brief Summary pages, especially as the mountains seem too far away to show up very clearly. In your photo on the left, the contrast between the dark road and sunny area behind it is too great for the film to cope with, so we don't see detail either of the road or the mountain. I can't really see what it is at the bottom of your photo on the right, and, as you've got the horizon almost dividing the picture into two equal halves, I'm not sure where you mean the emphasis to be. But the colors are certainly attractive. |
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Go on to YOUR PHOTOS (148) Please don't forget to sign my GUEST BOOK before you leave the site! NEXT PAGE PICKING THE BEST VIEWPOINT |
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