Yeah, compo on the second is far from ideal but I was not on the bank, it was too muddy. The promenade has a balustrade; so taking a step back was not an option as it would be visible on the pic if I wanted to keep part of the reflection in it. I have one without but think it's super boring haha Thanks Gareth!

Thanks for taking the time to comment

Am I missing something here? You have already entered this competition. You can't post two photos. That's why you don't have the button anymore?

Early Sunday morning stroll in thick fog. The first one is a 3 shot bracket. Rest just regular snaps Cc more than welcome.

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Artistically, you can shoot with just about anything. Professionally, it's another story. Why do a product shoot with a K100D and not a K1? The answers are rather obvious. And yes, there are very good photographers out there and the OP is undoubtly an example of one, that can take a good picture with a bucket....but that might very well not be enough for a client that needs his precious photo printed at 1million pixels wide.

Technology is a wonderful thing; why would anyone not want to benefit from better performance if one can afford it, is beyond me. Why would anyone risk putting his business in jeopardy because they practice the 'I shoot with what I've got' philosophy ? Very quickly, someone else will come along that does what you do, better; with better gear, that often facilitates better turn around time etc.

People pay for the most awkward things; from medium format wedding photos to genuine film pet shoots. A friend of mine had a client approach him for an iphone, post wedding reception, photo session. He paid, he got it. That included going out an actually buying an iphone as he did not own one.

And last, but not least; part of photography as a hobby, is gear. Even if you don't print big, post on social media, you may one day wake up and feel an irresistible urge to pixel peep your latest shot. And why not? If it makes you happier? Even if it touches on some insecurities you have and makes them smaller? Hell, why not? Will it make you a better photographer? Maybe, maybe not. Some will be motivated to live up to their gear, others won't care; still others simply won't be capable of being better. We all have different talents.

At the end of the day, it's the enjoyment it brings that counts if you ask me

It's not a bad place to start at all I use it regularly. But in my humble opinion, it only has 2 benefits over manual blending - it's a time saver, and the learning curve is not as steep. It's a very good tool but for me, the creative control is limited in comparison to the alternative method that I am exploring.

Photomatix is handy and good value for money, that said, after a while, I found it just wasn't giving me enough subtle control. It seems fine for simple exposure fusions, but the actual tone mapping options are mostly on the 'harsh' side imo. So personally I am back to Photoshop and learning blending exposures with luminosity masks. I'm far from skilled in the process but even clumsily following tutorials is giving me much nicer results than Photomatix. As for in camera HDR, it's mostly horrendous haha.

One thing to consider as well, is print. DR of paper is less than the DR of digital sensors; it's very easy to ignore that and end up with a subpar print because we pushed the light a step too far in whichever direction; rather tough to judge 'by eye' in Photomatix.

Photomatix is good for processing those pics that will likely stay on your PC, but for those special shots, I think it's worth the time to learn to process them manually. It is, however, time consuming initially. Struggling to find that time myself. There are action sets that help with the processing out there, both free and premium, and they do speed things up substantially. I suppose, with time, one is able to develop their own.

I also bracket often instead of using grad NDs; when blending, I am not after the typical HDR look, and for that I find Photomatix nearly useless.

Part of the reason I am not a fan of the social media photo sharing formula is that I feel people feel obliged to 'like' stuff to get liked back. It's particularly prominent on 500px but also true for flickr, fb, instagram and even Nat Geo's own platform. People that network well are 'rated' higher. Is it wrong? I don't know but it's certainly not my thing. Ha, Simon beat me to it

Good to hear that Chris. K3II was quite good at high iso in the daytime but on the terrible side the moment light was scarce

Catfish...I like that haha. One of many local 'beach' cats Wasn't too kin on posing sadly. I did apply some noise reduction in post using the Topaz Denoise plugin, light RAW preset with little adjustments, so not too bad of a result. This was just past sunset time, on a rather murky day, so light wasn't brilliant. I did take a few shots with the K3II and at 1600, it produced nothing I'd keep so overall rather pleased.