Hi!

This past week, I spent an evening photographing in a nearby town - and I was thrilled to find that daffodils have begun to bloom! The temperatures have been weird here (freezing and hot and freezing again), but it feels like we’re heading into our Michigan spring, and I for one am very excited!

Anyway, feel free to ignore my ramblings about the weather and skip to the good stuff. Here’s what I have in this Saturday newsletter:

• The new dPS bi-weekly challenge
• An update on the Photography Virtual Summit
• More photo critiques!

Let’s dive right in!

The bi-weekly photo challenge:

From Sime:

"We’re taking it back to a theme we tried before, but we didn’t get a lot of people give it a try! I’d love for more people to try this time around... and if you’re having trouble – something new here – share the photo that you made (but don’t like) in our Facebook Group and ask for help. It’d be great to see people that can offer advice and suggestions for improvement helping those that can’t..."

YOUR THEME FOR THE NEXT TWO WEEKS: LIGHT PAINTING – Make sure you include the hashtags #dPSWeeklyChallenge and #dPSBlindingLights in your post.

The 5Day Deal Virtual Photo Summit (an update)

Last week, I shared news of the Photography Virtual Summit, which included two days full of world-class instruction on a variety of topics, including Photoshop, Lightroom, travel photography, smartphone photography, macro photography, and more!

Well, the Summit took place this past week, and it was a huge success. For those of you who attended, what did you think? Did you enjoy the courses?

And for those who didn’t attend BUT who are still interested in viewing the sessions, just a quick note:

You can still grab a VIP pass, which will give you lifetime access to the Summit session recordings, as well as various bonus videos, presets, and tools provided by the Summit instructors. 

However, the VIP pass will only be available until the end of the month, so if you want to purchase it, make sure you act fast. Here’s the link!

Two more photo critiques

This week, I have two more image critiques to share!

As usual, thanks so much to everyone who sent in images (and for those of you who would like to see your images critiqued, feel free to hit Reply to this message and send along a file or two!).

First, we have a beautiful landscape from Steve: 

Things I like:

• First of all, Steve, I’m struck by how peaceful this image feels. I think that’s a result of the symmetrical composition - you’ve achieved clear symmetry along the horizontal axis thanks to the reflection, but you’ve also captured a more subtle symmetry along the vertical axis (with the cluster of taller trees in the center of the image, then the smaller stands of trees spreading out on either side), which I love.
• The colors are wonderful - you have a lovely combination of blues and greens, with occasional orange/yellow accents in the trees. In my experience, color is often ignored by photographers, and as a result, things can get messy, but you’ve done a great job of selecting a scene with lots of color harmony. This also contributes to the zen-like feeling of the image, I think!
• I’m loving the light - the low(ish) sun is hitting the scene from the right-hand side, which adds shadows that carve out the landscape and create that wonderful sense of three-dimensionality and separation between the different elements.

Things to improve:

• I would recommend accentuating the symmetry even more, if possible! For instance, when composing (or cropping), you could try to center the horizontal axis of symmetry more fully. I would consider composing a bit wider; that way, you could have more of the sky’s reflection at the bottom of the frame.
• When composing an image, it’s often important to pay special attention to the edges of the frame - do they cut anything off? Do they leave room for objects just inside the frame? Here, the right-hand edge looks pretty good, but on the left, the frame is cutting off a tiny patch of trees along the top of the hills, as well as some sort of structure behind the foreground trees. I’d consider cropping in just a tad to get rid of those elements. (Note that it’s not always bad to cut off elements at the edge of the frame, but when things are cut that way, it often emphasizes those specific elements while giving a more random, dynamic feeling to the entire scene. For this beautiful image, I’d personally try to go for simplicity and symmetry instead.)

Second, we have a sweeping cityscape from Tony:

Things I like:

• I really appreciate the depth in this image, Tony, with the leading line of the walkway sweeping in from the left, plus the foreground, midground, and background layers that really add to that sense of three-dimensionality.
• You’ve also captured a lot of gorgeous detail - the plants growing in the walls on the left, the reflections, the people walking, the architecture - it’s a feast for the eyes!
• And I love how big this image feels; you have these large structures that set the scene, but when you start to look around, you see the tiny streetlamps, people, etc. That contrast really gives the photo an impressive sense of scale.
• I also think the shot is conceptually interesting, with the mix of old architecture and new graffiti, the paved pathway with people dressed in contemporary clothing, right next to the weathered stone wall.

Things to improve:

• I know I mention this a lot when critiquing cityscapes and architectural shots, but I’d be tempted to do a slight perspective correction - it’s subtle, but it looks to me like the vertical lines along the edge of the frame are leaning inward (look at the vertical rod on the top of the left-most building, next to the statue - to my eye, it’s slanted to the right). 
• I’m noticing that the sky feels relatively flat compared to the rest of the frame - you have tons of crisp detail and contrast in the buildings, but the clouds seem less contrasty and softer. This might be due to changes made in post-processing; depending on the sharpening and contrast adjustments that have been applied, the sky may have been too heavily avoided, while the more detailed portions of the images have been overly targeted. I’d recommend decreasing these adjustments and see if that evens things out!
• I like how the light has sculpted the buildings on the left, but I wish that the structures on the right weren’t so shrouded in shadow; for me, it makes the image feel a little off-balance. I do think the shot is very nice as it is, but I’d love to see how it would look if you were to walk farther to the right and swing your camera to point more toward the left-hand side of the image, where the light is hitting the scene more heavily! 

As always, I hope that helps - and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your weekend!

Talk to you next Saturday,

Jaymes Dempsey (and the dPS team)