I think that the concept and exposure is good but IMHO could be improved by a slight change in position.

The natural 'horizon line' is the far bank of the water. By using the 'good old' rule of thirds I would suggest that if you had taken a lower position and placed this line 2/3 up the frame it would then use the water as a natural lead in.
It would also 'expand' the water in the lower frame acting as a 'subject'.

As you are looking 'through a gap' this might also work slightly better in 'portrait' which makes it slightly less 'busy'.



However I have many many images, like this that are okay but could just do with a little sprinkle of pixie dust to make them good. I just wish I had a bag of dust with me when I took them

First one was a rickety old jetty near to our campsite in Denmark and the second a lake in Sweden. Both taken with a k5ii(s)

1. Lens DA* 16-50 @ 16mm, ISO 80, 30 seconds @ f22 with Hitech Big Stopper. Mild sharpening in LR4




2. Lens DA 12-24 @ 12mm, ISO 80, 70 seconds @ f22 with a Hitech ND grad (sky) and Hitech Big stopper. This took a lot of PP to remove colour casts.



I'm fairly happy with the first one (in fact we have a canvas print of it hanging on our wall) but not so sure about the second.

All C&C welcome

Mike
Thanks for the comment, this is the Pentax version of the iPhone shot:

ISO80, 1/5000 @f2.8

No problem It's all part of the joys of participating in forum discussions

Just as an amusing aside to this; when I stood there waiting for the magical midnight (I don't really know why but I did :blush there were more DSLR's, amongst the crowd, per square foot that I would care to count.
People were fiddling with their apertures, swapping lenses, pressing buttons, etc. etc. all desperate to capture the moment.

I remembered that I wanted to update our facebook page and so I pulled out my iPhone 5, pointed it generally in the right direction and took this:




The guy next to me (with a very expensive Canon around his neck) did the same with his iPhone 4. We were both amazed by the ability of the phones camera to capture the scene and were, if I'm honest, a bit disappointed that we have spent all this effort and money on expensive DSLRs when a phone can do this!

Of course my Pentax is so much more versatile and allows so much more creativity that the disappointment was only fleeting and more a source of amusement, but for just a moment..........

Thank you

Interesting comment as the focus point was not altered from one shot to the other and they have both had exactly the same amount of PP.

It would seem that opinions are split on these two images.

Does anyone have any tips on avoiding the aberrations/lens flare when shooting into the sun like this. I normally keep a UV filter on the lens, as a protector, for general shots but specifically removed it for this shot to get rid of another layer of glass.

If you really want to be pedantic
Nordkapp is actually a district which spans the island and the mainland and includes both the point shown in the picture, Kinarodden and Knivskellodden.

I suppose, technically, I should have said "taken in Nordkapp" rather than "taken at Nordkapp", sorry about that

However it was definitely inside the Arctic Circle (I felt the bump as we drove over it), the Sun was definitely in the sky, I was definintly looking north and it was definitely 6 (and 7) minutes after midnight

We were only there for a couple of hours and my admiration for SAABs has now gone through the roof.

Yes we went to see the lock gates:




Well worth the time we spent

Try again
During a recent road trip to the Arctic Circle we stopped and spent few hours at the SAAB museum in Sweden. Although I wasn't that interested in SAAB cars beforehand I found the place fascinating and thoroughly enjoyed it.

There was combination of natural and artificial light as well as big differences in space around the cars.

I though I would share a few images to see if you think I could have done anything different. All taken with a K5ii(s) and DA* 16-50 using available light only.

The Aero X concept car:

The first two are multi-exposure shots combined in photomatrix. I then sharpened them slightly and added a vigneting effect, in PSE 10, to try and 'lose' the background a bit. Both ISO 800.

1.



2.



3. Single image ISO 400, 1/50 @ f2.8



4. ISO 800, 1/60 @ 2.8.



5. ISO 800, 1/100 @ f10



6. ISO 400, 1/80 @ f5



7. ISO 1250, 1/60 @ f2.8



8. ISO 800, 1/80 @ f3.2



9. and finally another multi exposure shot combined in photomatrix and finished off in PSE 10



all of these have a slight amount of sharpening and shadow/highlight tweaking with LR4.

I could have stayed here all day trying to get just the right angle with just the right lighting. I found the reflections and cramped space difficult to work with. I would welcome any comments on how to do it better should I ever end up in a similar situation.

Yippee

Comments now welcome