Abandoned granite quarry, MA coast

[DanK]

and another. Have at it.

[Geoff F]

Some interesting textures and subtle colours but I would like to see all of the fir tree. Also a fraction more water or none of it.

[Round Tuit]

I ask myself what made you take this picture.

Having said that, I agree with Geoff that slightly more water would help provide more depth but I would also consider cropping the top down to the top of the small dark bush in the middle then cropping in a bit from the right. That would make the white bush in the middle more of a focal point to start exploring the scene.

On the processing side, I would slightly boost both the contrast and clarity/texture then do some dodging and burning on the grey slab bottom right.

[DanK]

Thanks for the comments.

This is a classic case of a vista that is striking in real life but very difficult to turn into an interesting photograph.

Here's the original:



You can see that I have already done a lot of the sort of editing that Andre suggests. I used texture and clarity in LR, contrast, local contrast (which, with a 50 pixel radius, I think is coarser than texture) with USM in photoshop set to a luminosity blend, and a good bit of burning. The rocks at the bottom right are light enough that burning turns them a plastic-looking gray, so I used a duplicate layer set to multiply, with everything but those rocks masked out. I fiddled with color, mostly in Lightroom, using the calibration settings and point color. Most of this was to accentuate texture and color contrasts.

But maybe there just isn't enough there there. I have a weak spot for this sort of thing, and it isn't widely shared. Years ago, I had prints in a gallery for maybe 18 months. The director wanted almost every print I selected for her. However, she rejected the one below, which I love and have hanging on the wall:

[Round Tuit]

I too would consider the second one a wall hanger. I love the textures and colours.