I have invested in a couple of editing tutorials. The first session was this morning and I thought I had followed everything pretty well on the use of Adobe Raw. However, now that I come to follow my notes and edit my own photo, it seems some confusion remains!
I will persevere!
Spent a while watching this fellow this afternoon in the hope that I might see him catch a fish. I have no idea how many dives he might have to make in order to find his meal, but his fishing skills seemed sadly lacking - or perhaps my patience was more the problem as I moved on without witnessing any success.
I have the tutorial on my laptop and follow along step by step on my desk top, but I still miss some things! This Grebe photo is a great grab, I wonder if you could crop it tighter, the branch isn't adding much....
@theredcamera My tutorial was a one to one zoom session and so I am reliant on my (now proven to be ) inadequate notes. Thanks for your comment on the image - I always enjoy feedback. You are right, the funny thing is that I was originally looking at the potential for the branch (and its neighbour) for making an image but abandoned that. However, this is already a heavy crop - I don't have a long lens.
Although the patterns of the water are fascinating by themselves it does make it a rather busy image. I have read the comments above and thought might be able to add something useful to you. I wonder if you had a bit more space around the bird, rather than crop in further and if you give a little more room for the bird to swim into the image that would help. If you cropped out the branch the reflection would still be there, so I would be inclined to leave it in and possibly the top of branch as well. I think the image might be too contrasty, because the shadows are taking away some detail and I would reduce the highlights (or white) a tad. This is always the problem shooting in harsh lighting conditions. If you are using Lightroom (as well as Photoshop) it is quite easy to use an adjustment brush. I think the same is in Adobe RAW, but I never use that programme. Finally reduce the vibrance/saturation/dehaze (whichever you used) a bit to make it look more natural. You may find that improves the reflections in the water. I hope that is helpful? I would experiment making many different versions until you get one you are happy with! Best of luck!
I find both the Grebe and the reflections totally grab my attention making the branch only a minor distraction. What you've done well with that imho is there is a nice fluid diagonal that runs from the lower left through the Grebe and up to the branch, so the way I see the picture, it's balanced. If you're really bothered by it though, you could try a horizontal crop that takes out most the branch and the clone out the rest- but that would be an artistic choice- I don't think you really need to do it. All in all, it's a good shot!
Ok, here's my 2-cents...1st - what were you trying to do with the tutorial...cropping? color? etc? I'm trying to figure that out too...Maybe a little less cropping? Give both grebe & branch more space & balance. Just a thought. Let me know if you're open to critique as well as comment....
@marshwader thank you for going to so much trouble to make some suggestions. I have worked on the image some more and came out with a completely different edit. In the end though, I did feel that it was not a strong enough image to persist with but I really appreciate your contribution.
@olivetreeann thanks Ann for your comments on this. It is really interesting to get the critique. As I said above, the image is not good enough to be worth working on further although I did have a look and make some changes according to all the suggestions above - just to see the various effects.
@granagringa Thank you for your comments Madeline. Yes I am quite open to critique and welcome it - it is the way to learn and always of interest to see what others pick up on. You (and others) are right about the crop - I went in too tight because the background was so busy, but it didn't really help. The tutorial was on making adjustments to the raw image prior to taking it into photoshop.
@helenhall Most welcome! I did a quickie edit on your image imagining it to be mine. If there is a way to send it to you, I will and include roughly what I did if that helps? I am contactable via my website: maddypennock.co.uk (to save putting personal emails here).
