Critique needed

[J.R.]

Very nice colors in the posted pic and extremely odd that the jpg should be a washout.

 

[wayno]

Nice image - and not much to fault really - but I must say I find photos of sunsets a little uninspiring. It's the things that the sunset is shining upon that make the more interesting subjects for me.

 

[CarlTN]

Thanks J.R. and Wayno. I agree, although a sunset itself is still nice. I like how the overall color temperature changes over time, and how many different compositions and colors you get with clouds. The real trick is to get the color temperature and tint, tweaked just right in post (and even tweaking the grayscale sliders a bit)...to keep things from looking all one color.

Another freaky thing, is when part of the sky turns green, or vivid, or pale aqua. You can usually capture that fairly well with a camera, too. I find I usually have to cut the aqua and blue sliders a bit, in the grayscale menu...especially if a healthy boost of vibrance slider has been added.

I also like the vivid violet tints you usually see with sunrises as opposed to sunsets...but alas I don't see as many sunrises.

I want to post some other sunset shots in that other thread dedicated to them, but haven't gotten around to it. A couple feature a tornado shaped shadow cast onto high clouds...done by a tall thunderstorm cloud, that is below the horizon.

Best of all would have been a very nearby thunder cloud I saw in 1999, where the top 20% was lit by the orange sunset glow, but as I looked farther toward the bottom...it didn't just turn a simple blue. It looked like a giant iceberg...a vivid spectrum of blueish green, aqua. Alas I had no camera at that time. It probably went up 45,000 feet or more, it was gigantic. Yet the air was farily clear all around it. At least I still see it in my mind.

 

[paul13walnut5]

Thanks Carl ... I did shoot a few more - here are the samples

Hey J-R your untilted 4 is almost the shot I would have taken. Much more interesting use of perspective (telephoto compression)

Look up 'The Photographers Ephemeris' excellent web version, and really very useful app version (not free as an app, but money well spent) will help you nail the sunrise sunset times for any given location, and crucially where the sun will be just before sunrise and just after sunset, when I personally think the light is best.

 

[J.R.]

Thanks Carl ... I did shoot a few more - here are the samples

Hey J-R your untilted 4 is almost the shot I would have taken. Much more interesting use of perspective (telephoto compression)

Look up 'The Photographers Ephemeris' excellent web version, and really very useful app version (not free as an app, but money well spent) will help you nail the sunrise sunset times for any given location, and crucially where the sun will be just before sunrise and just after sunset, when I personally think the light is best.

Thanks paul13walnut5! I'm learning something new everyday on CR . I've installed the web version and must say it is really excellent. I had been using timeanddate.com for determining sunrise / sunset timings, but 'The Photographers Ephemeris' leaves it well and truly, in the dust.

 

[paul13walnut5]

Thanks paul13walnut5! I'm learning something new everyday on CR . I've installed the web version and must say it is really excellent. I had been using timeanddate.com for determining sunrise / sunset timings, but 'The Photographers Ephemeris' leaves it well and truly, in the dust.

If you have an iphone or android phone then the app is exceptionally useful, tied to GPS as well, so gives you data for your current or a chose location. Steven Trainor is a telented bloke.

Re: sRGB versus AdobeRGB. If you are mainly sharing your images via the web or computer display, or for video, work in sRGB as it comes out better. If you intend to print then set your camera up for AdobeRGB. This is speaking very generally. There will be shots you print that you also want to share etc. If you shoot RAW and work in 16bit TIFFs or PSD's at the computer you can change colour profiles at the edit stage, probably not advisable with JPEGS so much.

 

[CarlTN]

My recent experience has been...switching color profiles when viewing/editing a RAW file, from Adobe RGB to ProPhoto RGB...sometimes gives a more natural color palette via my monitor, but it also always makes the apparent color saturation, less so. This translates the same when I convert to jpeg. So, even though the image portrays more of the dynamic range (there's little need for recovery of the shadows or the highlights when I switch to ProPhoto)...it also seems to "crush" much of the tonality and color in the shadow areas...especially after converting to jpeg.

I don't usually see a reason to shoot in jpg mode, but when I do it, I still leave the camera set to Adobe RGB, and haven't noticed a problem with the color when viewed on my monitor. I don't print many of my images that were originally shot as jpg.

I really see no reason to ever shoot in sRGB mode, because again, the resulting jpgs after conversion, look as good or better via web-sized images, as those done in sRGB. What makes more difference for a small jpg viewed on the web, are the various attributes the host web page decides for you...especially how they decide to make the thumbnail-sized images "pop" or not. I admit I don't comprehend their methods very much.