Ending and Beginning

[teokf]

Not sure whether this is considered a landscape or catching the moment on the street.

I saw this man sitting by the pier and seems to be reflecting how his day has been, while the fishing trawler is leaving port on the start of it's journey for a good catch.

I feel the bright light on the sky around man is over exposed and hurt the viewer's eyes. How to tone down this part without affecting the other parts of the photo? Anyway, please leave your critique and comments as I would like to hear them to further improve my photography. Thank you.

[dje]

I like the shot Steven, lovely colours.

You could tone down the very bright areas by using the Quick Selection tool in PS and then adding a Brightness Adjustment layer. This will produce a layer mask and on this layer you reduce the brightness to suit. However I thnk some of these areas are blown out and won't be able to be recovered - ie reducing the brightness will not be totally effective. If the image was shot in raw, you may have more chance of getting rid of the blown out sections using Recovery slider for example in ACR.

Dave

[teokf]

Dave, thanks for giving me an idea to approach this issue.

[arith]

I think it says a lot; it is the end of his day and the start of the trawlers. I can remember when I drove a truck starting 15 hour nights at 4pm, seeing normal people going home and then seeing them again at 7am on the way to work.

I like the colours and silhouette.

[Geoff F]

A photo retouching expert would be able to select the correct colour from areas which aren't quite over exposed then paint them over the blown out areas.

Working on a layer with a suitable Blend Mode.

I have managed something similar on occasions; but not with expert results!

[teokf]

Geoff, I am glad to have joined this forum as the amount of help that has come in is just great.

[Rob Douglas]

I like the idea of the composition you where aiming for here. I would have done just two things differently. 1st, would have been to have my focal point about 50mm back from the person (his shilloette size is slightly over powering) 2nd, would be to have composed the shot slightly more to the right to give a bit more separation to the two subjects in this image. With that being said, this image is still able to be processed as a keeper. The only real thing to work on with this image for me would be to try and recover the over exposed area behind the gentalmans head. That area looks to be blown out so if you have CS5 or an editing program of the like you might be better off brushing in some sampled tones from the warmer area in the center of the sky.