River view

[MilT0s]

I photographed this scene during a walk by the canal in Berlin. I chose unrealistic colors in PP to exaggerate the surreality. Does it work for you?

[terrib]

It does work, I think. It's a neat photo. The light seems to showcase the couch. The only thing that bothers me, I'm not sure you can do anything about. That green post in the middle keeps drawing my eye.

[MilT0s]

Thank you Terri for your thoughts.

I have already desaturated and darkened the stupid green post

I tried but didn't find another composition for the post to be less prominent.

[Mike Buckley]

The colors don't seem surreal to me at all. That's good because the surreality is the result of the sofa.

Try toning down the foreground grass considerably, as it is the first thing that I see. I'm sure you want the sofa to be the first thing.

As for the post, I blended the color of the sofa with the color of the post and adjusted it to almost match the color of the large pipes. Perhaps that treatment works for you.

[pnodrog]

The colours are fine. The compositional balance seems to favour the middle and left. How about cropping it more tightly to around the sofa looking out to the view of the pipes. For me the right hand side is not making much of a contribution to the overall image. The post does not worry me but you could try darkening the base of it just above the rust.

Certainly an odd and interesting scene.

[Mike Buckley]

Now that I've seen L. Paul's suggested crop, I tried a square format and it dramatically improved everything for me.

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Miltos,

It does work, apart from;
the "stupid green post"
the non vertical brickwork (looks like you may have straightened, or composed, for the sofa corners to be vertical instead)
I tend to agree with L.Paul about losing a bit from the RHS

HTH,

[MilT0s]

Thank you everyone, great suggestions!

Here is a newer version:




I think it indeed works better.

[MilT0s]

I come back to this one because there is another question I want to ask:

Is it obvious to you that this is a HDR photo or not?

[Donald]

Is it obvious to you that this is a HDR photo or not?

No, it is not. And that is a very good thing.

[Dave Humphries]

Is it obvious to you that this is a HDR photo or not?

No, not at all - but I don't understand why it needs to be - the tonal range in a reflective scene really doesn't warrant it

[MilT0s]

Donald, Dave thank you for your replies. I was aiming for a subtle effect but with HDR it's very easy to go crazy without noticing it.

Dave the scene was under the bright sun and shadows from the trees. My first shot had problems in the shadows behide the sofa when exposed for the sunny side so I decided to give it a little boost. Perhaps that's not very obvious since I have dodged the upper part extensively.

If you look closely you will notice a halo around the right part of the sofa