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Hi All,

Looks like a great forum and I'm really looking forward to learning lots.

Just bought my first DSLR on my trip to Vietnam. Lots of things to learn.......
My first 4 pictures at different focal lengths using the kit lens. Now that I've had a little bit of a play, my plan is to get the 85 1.8 and with one less variable to worry about I'll start experimenting with the ISO/Av/Speed Triangle and white balance.


20mm 9.0 1/80 ISO100


53mm 8.0 1/200 ISO100


72mm 8.0 1/200 ISO100


126mm 6.3 1/200 ISO100 (Cropped)

Haven't really starting processing yet but figured I'll keep shooting dual RAW/JPEG until I've figured out how to use the camera properly first, can process later and compare against the camera's JPEG.


Thanks,

Dave.

Hi and welcome Dave.

Some nice images for your first post, you will pick up lots of hints and tips from here if you stay around.

Never been to Vietnam, but it is on my wish list  PS you need to place a meaningful location in your profile before the mods see you have not! (See the pink bit above).

Thanks Geoff,
Location added to my profile. I can definitely recommend Vietnam, especially of you like good food & friendly people.
Cheers,
Dave.

Hey Dave, welcome to the sleepy little corner of the net that is..DSLRusers.

no point in beatin' around teh bush.

1) shoulda gone wider, there is a bride in there which would have turned this image from a holiday snapshot to a image worthy of pursuing further. The extra element of the bride would hold interest and give the viewer more than just a glorified front door

3) this is the pick of the bunch for me, it has teh makings of a good shot, simple composition, good anchor point, the hills add nice depth to teh image, the only extra compositional item that would make it really nice is a person, possibly on the RHS of the frame.

hth and have fun.

Welcome! (:

I'm sure the rowdy bunch of dslrusers can help you develop and pursue the skills you possess hidden within.

I'm a big fan of the first image, I love the lines and I love the way the the building distorts, guess that's just me.

One suggestion would be to crop out the stairs at the base, potentially crop as an 8x10 and we might have a contender here. I love the tonal range you're getting from these images as well, the greens in the second image is quite like true tones and I'd suggest using daylight WB in most situations outdoors during the day as you would achieve somewhat some form of consistency. That's just my opinion, don't take it to heart too much and don't listen to it 100%

Hi Dave, and welcome.

Some nice images here; well done.

I like what you've done in the third here. Can you perhaps try bumping the contrast a little?

For the second image, may I suggest that you crop this image from just to the right of the rightmost tree? Leave just a little bit of air to its right, and see how that works for you as an image?

And maybe - for all of them - applying a little bit of sharpening in your post processing?

As a general observation (and I hate spending time on post) you'll probably find that adding a nudge of sharpening to your images in post will be a very useful task for you.

Hi DJK,

Welcome!

Another hint about the sharpness is that the forum software will resize anything over 800pix wide. This will cause softness as well. I find that resizing to 775 pixels is useful before uploading to retain sharpness.

Thanks to all for your comments.

To be honest, I was expecting a lot more criticism, guess you’re always your own worst judge.

Thanks for your suggestions Gary. I posted the camera produced JPEGs as I am still a little intimidated by post. Biting the bullet but don’t know if I took it too far or not far enough.... I guess I like the look better than the camera JPEG, but am just a bit worried that I’m losing some of the “reality” of the picture:

Would love to hear your feedback. (cropping was a great idea, also loses some of the spotlights in the left tree). I initially cropped closer to the right tree, but ended up with the arching branch of the left tree cutting the top edge which to me didn't look right. I can see how I could spend hours and hours trying improve it only to find the last part of it made the picture worse. Much more fun to take the picture in the field.

One of the things I’m a bit curious about is how to me the last picture seems to have some noise (especially when trying to make out the woman’s features). I’d expect this for low light, high ISO pictures, but this was in the sun at ISO100. Does anyone know what I’ve done wrong here or is it simply that my kit lens at 126mm (and cropped to about 80% of the original size) doesn’t give me clear enough quality?

Thanks again,

Dave.

Hi Dave,

DJK wrote:To be honest, I was expecting a lot more criticism, guess you’re always your own worst judge.

Hopefully, yes.

But here we also believe that we should be trying to help you. Simply saying "that picture sucks" helps nobody. If we can offer positive suggestions ("can you try to crop it this way" or "maybe this might work in B&W") we hope that you can be encouraged to see different ways to bring out the best in what you've done.

Please don't be discouraged if, sometimes, there are few or no comments against a post. This means that your image is brilliant.

Or perhaps that it sucks so badly that it's beyond redemption.

Or perhaps that it's merely difficult to offer honest, objective suggestions on.

Bottom line is to listen to what's said, but always understand that the images are your images, and it's always up to you to accept or reject the suggestions made. Nobody here will get their nose out of joint if you reject their suggestions.

And also keep in mind that it's the images we're critiquing, not you.

Thanks for your suggestions Gary. I posted the camera produced JPEGs as I am still a little intimidated by post.

"Hi, I'm Gary, and I'm a postaholic .... "Post can be very intimidating. I don't like doing it much at all (hell, I spend my days in front of computers, and post is just more of the same) and there's no shame in admitting this.

Losing what you perceive as the reality is an important thing to be mindful of. You need to keep in mind the fact that there is no camera available that comes close to matching the capabilities that our eyes and brain hold, and any image that we produce can only be a subset of our recollection of the reality.

With that in mind, always aim to satisfy yourself with your outcomes. My opinions (and those of others) are exactly that - opinions. We would like to help, but ultimately the images are yours, and it's whatever that you like from the images that is important here. There are many different ways that you can alter your images in post, and that takes time to both learn, as well as perform.

But the best way to learn is to be shooting. Shoot this, and that. Experiment, play. Try something that you think may be new. It'll be new to you, for sure. But don't be afraid: your camera is just a tool.

I prefer this version. I would have probably taken the crop a little further, but, as I've said, it's your image.

The one other thing that the crop has highlighted to me is that the horizon is not straight. Look at the far back of the river/lake. You mention that you would like to do some things in camera, and I heartily concur. I'm of the view that we should try to get the image right in the camera. I fail dismally, and have a ton of fun failing.

But to get to the point, one thing I often mention to people is the fact that we need to take a moment before shooting, and cast our eye around the viewfinder to see if everything is as we want it: is there a tree going out of the bride's head? Is there a kid on a tricycle in the background when you're trying to shoot a romantic image of a couple? Or is the horizon straight?

I initially cropped closer to the right tree, but ended up with the arching branch of the left tree cutting the top edge which to me didn't look right.

And that is absolutely, and correctly, the judgment call that you make. We suggest, you try the suggestion, and modify, accept or reject as you feel appropriate.

One of the things I’m a bit curious about is how to me the last picture seems to have some noise (especially when trying to make out the woman’s features). I’d expect this for low light, high ISO pictures, but this was in the sun at ISO100.

Ok, I'll start by saying that you've done nothing "wrong" at all, and your assertions here are, by and large, correct.

But let's go back a couple of steps, and try to understand a little of the technology in use here.

First of all, what metering mode were you using? I don't think your camera offers a spot metering mode, and most likely, you were using the default averaging mode, which tries to assess the whole scene and deal with it as an homogenous, non-complex scene that will resolve to grey.

That works perfectly well as long as your scene does in fact resolve to an average grey.

In this image (pretty much any time you go out into bright sunlight) that is not going to be the case, and you may find that you have come across a scene with a high range of light values within the image.There's the very brightly lit background - the roadway, and the trees, for instance. The lady who is the subject of the image is, however, in shade. I'm only guessing, but I'd say there's a three or four stop variation between those two parts of the image, and this this is a very difficult scene to get right.

You either expose for the sunlit areas, or expose for the shadowed areas ... or try to average it and get nothing exactly right (but still get something very usable) ...

Or you do things like adding light into the shadowed areas. Fill flash, reflectors, etc are all useful tools, advanced techniques ... and probably totally impractical given that you're on a holiday and wanting to enjoy yourself with your family.