Lacock Abbey and Village

[peterb533]

Taken at Lacock Abbey, the former home of William Talbot Fox, founder of modern photography. The shot of the window is where he took the first negative, which was about 1.5 inches square

[Bunter]

Hi Peter

Surprised no-one has responded to these - nice idea, visiting the former home of
Fox Talbot.

Re: the first image - I would have cropped the chimney from the left, and taken
some of that foreground away - maybe half of it?

The second one looks like it could do with straightening a little.

And the third one just seems unnaturally bright... particularly, the detail in the
foliage.

All just my humble opinion, etc.

cheers
B

[taken]

very strong,bold and beautiful looking pics these! very few tweakings are necesary, here and there,spcially in the corners that keep distracting the viewer.there is lot to see here,and the photographer has done justice in keeping the viewer glued to every detail. there is balance all around the images, with out over lapping themselves,over each other....personaly i would say,these are very national geographical type of pics

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Peter,

No.1 I think I can see what you were trying to do with the crop/compositional edge points on this, but I would have tried a free transform and grabbed the top left corner and wiggled it around until that chimney was parallel to the edge of frame. Unfortunately even then, I'm not sure other elements in the composition work as well as they might. Looking at it, I think the problem is that the lead in line to the archway formed by the edge of the lawn is just too far to the left. Not sure if stepping back a foot would have helped, or ruined the compostition elsewhere, but I think you need the grass to start no less than 2/3 from left edge, so the viewer is on the gravel and guided into the archway.

No. 2, I tend to agree with Bunter about this one, the bay window and doorway below are the key to the composition and they're leaning to the right significantly - primarily because you are standing off to right and have the camera pointing upwards

No.3 looks like you were in a very tight space and already as wide as you could get.
I would agree it is perhaps a little bright, not sure if it is over exposure (real or in PP), or a gamma tweak to lift the details that went too far - I struggle to get this kind of thing right myself , so I empathise.

No.4 - I can see why you took the picture but (IMHO) 3 things have conspired against a good photo:
- The top left corner needs a grab with free transform to pull the left edge to be vertical (as the right side is)
- The trunks of the ivy or climbing rose (or whatever) are quite distracting
- Either by cloning or framing, I'd lose that electrical box bottom left - again it draws the eye

On all the shots, I think, where possible*, I would recommend framing up with the camera level, rather than pointed up a bit with the intention of achieving an in camera 'correct' composition. This will waste pixels in the lower half of frame on foreground you don't need, but it is with the intention to cropping in PP, and with 5D Mk2, you should have enough resolution not to miss 'em.

* if you have a wide enough angle lens or enough space behind you to go back a few paces.

This can minimise/eliminate the need to perspective correct in PP or buy a tilt/shift lens.

For example, in this shot the centre point of the lens (and focus point) was on the doorstep of the subject, what you see is a big crop and that was on a 6MP bridge camera, not my D5000.

(click pic to see full size)

You can see why I wanted to avoid trying to perspective correct this one in PP
If you look at the full size and compare left edge with right for 'verticalness' you will see it is not quite right, but (I think) I get away with it

To wrap up; I wouldn't normally go for coloured borders; as on 3 and 4, but these work quite well.
As a matter of interest; did you choose the colours by eye, of take a sample from somewhere in the picture?

Hope that helps,