Grand Tetons

UpST8

First Post...gotta admit I am a bit intimidated by all the great photography on this site, but here goes nothing. Please feel free to critique composition and editing or anything else you may see that would be helpful for a nOOb Please use small words and layman terms, since I haven't quite figured all the vocabulary associated with photography :scratch

PS- All shots are from an Olympus Stylus Tough 8010

1) Grand Teton Lake Shore



2) Snake River Watershed



3)



4)

Icebear

First. Welcome aboard. Don't be intimidated by anything you see here. There are some extremely talented and technically adept people here. Most of them started out (not necessarily here) creating some pretty uninteresting images. It really is all about the practice. So long as you practice good stuff, and not making the same mistake over and over again.

OK. Here goes.
I'm assuming (oops?) that because you used the landscape program with your camera, you pretty much let it make all the decisions for you except for composition. I'm also assuming (oops, oops?) that you did no real post-processing on the images, and what we see is what came out of the camera. That being said, IMO there's a HUGE undesireable halo around the "driftwood" stump in #1. Looks like heavy-handed HDR processing.

#4 makes me think that someone with a Digital Rebel needs to clean his/her sensor. There's a monster UFO hovering over The Grand.

UpST8

Icebear wrote: »

First. Welcome aboard. Don't be intimidated by anything you see here. There are some extremely talented and technically adept people here. Most of them started out (not necessarily here) creating some pretty uninteresting images. It really is all about the practice. So long as you practice good stuff, and not making the same mistake over and over again.

OK. Here goes.
I'm assuming (oops?) that because you used the landscape program with your camera, you pretty much let it make all the decisions for you except for composition. I'm also assuming (oops, oops?) that you did no real post-processing on the images, and what we see is what came out of the camera. That being said, IMO there's a HUGE undesireable halo around the "driftwood" stump in #1. Looks like heavy-handed HDR processing.

#4 makes me think that someone with a Digital Rebel needs to clean his/her sensor. There's a monster UFO hovering over The Grand.

Thanks for the feedback!! Yep, used the auto landscape feature. Guess I figured the camera could make a better settings decision than I right now, but I am going to experiment and play around a lot more in the future. I did do some post-processing, not sure if I did more harm then good with it. Still trying to develop some eye for it. The stump halo was there before any processing, just looked back on it now. Will try harder in the future to eliminate or correct that.

The UFO was my wife's camera, will have to pay better attention to that as well.

Really do appreciate you taking the time to respond. Any criticism is great, I can't fix it if I don't think there is anything wrong. So, bring it on.

Icebear

What I would suggest is this: Read your camera's manual to find out what it does on various settings (like "Landscape" and "Portrait") so you can learn what YOU should do in those situations. Keep in mind that your camera is designed to be a point & shoot, no-brainer. That's why those scene modes are there. I'm guessing the reason you bought it is 'cause you're an outdoors person, and wanted a camera that would take a lickin' and keep on tickin,' right? Well you got a good one. Just be aware of its limitations. You'll learn a lot more shooting with your wife's camera. You have an excuse to go back to Jackson Hole. That's always a good thing!