Lost or Forgotten Gallery - CC please

TeamSpeed

We have several abandoned farm properties around the hoosier state, and my daughter and I have been hitting a few getting strange and eery shots where possible. If you have time, please check out my smugmug gallery and critique some of the shots. I need the pointers, and I definitely will pass on to my daughter with her S3.

http://snapintime.smugmug.com/gallery/2941766#158789662

One of my favs, due to the broken pane of glass and the tractor headlight sitting on the table inside. I need to watch the limits of the viewfinder to make sure I get the edges correct, I accidentally knocked off the top of the window. Bugs me enough, I may have to make another trip out to that piece of property and try again.

philiphutson

TeamSpeed wrote:

We have several abandoned farm properties around the hoosier state, and my daughter and I have been hitting a few getting strange and eery shots where possible. If you have time, please check out my smugmug gallery and critique some of the shots. I need the pointers, and I definitely will pass on to my daughter with her S3.

http://snapintime.smugmug.com/gallery/2941766#158789662

One of my favs, due to the broken pane of glass and the tractor headlight sitting on the table inside. I need to watch the limits of the viewfinder to make sure I get the edges correct, I accidentally knocked off the top of the window. Bugs me enough, I may have to make another trip out to that piece of property and try again.

From the album this one is my favorite also. I don't feel the chopped window frame is a problem. In this one you did what you didn't do in most of the others (I did just a quick perusal) you didn't include extraneous stuff (something I'm still working on and a long way from mastering).
I like #4 from the album I just don't like the treatment, you might also try cropping in the right hand side.
I think #9 would be better without the distracting bright leaf at the top.
Aditionally one good thing I can say is that building up a portfolio or album of a common theme is very good, it forces you to try and shoot similar things from a new angle/perspective/view/composition.
-Philip

ShepsMom

Good shot and sepia is a good choice in my opinion

rundadar

It's a good shot.

I've also looked at the gallery. May I (humbly) suggest something? A few suggestions, actually.

I'd say, the 'lost and forgotten' stuff is better photographed in the most natural OR the most UN-natural way. Your PP seems to be somewhere in the middle. Specifically, I'd suggest to try to either:

a.) leave them in colour, don't sharpen at all (even in-camera, if you shoot RAW), don't do anything with noise - let it be... don't even increase contrast. In other words - give the shots a 'super-snapshot' feel. You might be surprised how effective that total lack of PP can be in the day and age where everyone is a "PP guru".

OR

b.) PP away! Make them B&W proper! Super-contrasty. Burn, dodge, combine multiple layers in different blending modes, oversharpen crazily...add noise, intentionally apply the wrong colour balance - in other words - make them spooky, strange, mysterious, wrong, thought-provoking...

I think - either approach would work.

Also - take more shots, some of the scenes seem like they have a lot of potential (close-ups maybe? unusual angles?) yet were left 'underexplored'

Cheers,

Alex