Landscapes #483

My winning image in this contest is this stunning view of Scarborough lighthouse at sunrise. Effort is often rewarded in photography, and here the photographer has gotten themselves in place before the sun is up, and has this fabulous result to show for it. The longer shutter speed, faciltated by the lower light conditions, has resulted in a gorgeous effect on the water. I love the way that the lighthouse's support structure lines up perfectly with the shoreline in the distance, and the colours of the artificial lights work brilliantly next to the stunning hues of the rising sun. The photographer has shown restraint in their post processing of the image, and the whole is believable and a real treat for the viewer.

This is a very atmospheric study, lovely dark and bright layers, and the white mist creates a very effective backdrop to the smaller trees inthe foreground. Ordinarily having a telegraph pole so close to the edge of the shot might be problematic, but here it seems to work, and the cables add another horizontal feature to the image.

Almost a Top-10 shot for me this one, with a great use of the square crop, and doing really well to shoot into the low sun whilst retaining good colour in the scene. I love the placement of the tree nice and high in the shot, which is justified by the strong shadow andthe detail in the grass..

And now for something completely different... This is a very interesting image, takes me back to the days of slide film, and all those associated memories, and I like the creativity that's on display.

Well, there's absolutely nothing to fault here, and like any great photograph you can sit and stare at it for a good long while and not get bored. I love the muted, cold tone of the image, and the interest that is provided by the turbulent sky and the clouds casting their shadows on the ground. It appears pin sharp from front to back, and it goes without saying that the photographer has found themselves an absolutely stunning landscape to shoot.

I really love this, it's such a strange and brilliant composition. And kudos to the photographer for managing to shoot such a great picture from a moving tran. "Luck", you say? Well, they've made their own luck! The telegraph pole and wires on the right of the shot are a stroke of genius, and balance the bushes and old train perfectly.

This is a real picture postcard shot, extremely pleasing on the eye, and very evocative. The composition works well in this square format, which is a format that I never tire of, and it's a great use of a foreground subject being used to add interest to the shot, and lead the viewer to the main subject in the background. Those gradually disappearing treelines in the distance are really lovely.

Landscapes without skies can be really effective, and the composition of this one is very good. There's a good depth to the image, with interesting foreground detail, and the natural curve of the valley and river leading off into the far distance. The way the image has been post-processed however is detracting from the strength of the image. The colours are far too saturated and have become over-powering, and the image also looks to have been too heavily sharpened. Less is more when it comes to editing software!

I wanted to commend this image, as it's got some good qualities - the warm light on the rocks, shot from a nice low angle, and the nice bright colours of the sea and sky - but it's been sabotaged by a wonky horizon, which in a shot like this is critical to get right. Most editing software nowadays has a tool to easily check the horizon's angle, and should be an obligatory editing step for shots like this.

I really like the mood and feel of this shot. When you read that it's been taken from a train, the blur of the foreground and the reflections in the top left then make sense, and it becomes even more evocative. It would benefit from a slight adjustment of the horizon, to get it level, and in an ideal world there would be a little more reflection in the window, so that it's more obvious on first viewing that it's shot from a train.

Such a dramatic landscape shot, and when the Weather Photographer of the Year contest opens again next year then surely worth entering! The monotone of the image emphasises the all-encompassing nature of the sandstorm. It's a very tight crop at the bottom of the image, and whilst I think it works, it does leave one with very little context for the storm.

It can be surprisingly difficult to pull off a shot like this, and it's been done extremely well. There's a pleasingly even distribution of bathers and parasols, a dead straight and level horizon, and the perfect exposure of this bright sunny day in California. One thing that needs work here is the removal of a few dust spots on the snesor that have left black marks dotted throughout the image, most notably in the sea. Easily done in Photoshop, and the camera's sensor would have benefited from a clean!

This is technically excellent, and a beautiful study of this landscape, combining a gorgeous golden hour light with the rising moon. It's worth reading the photographer's description of how they took the shot, and again we see that effort pays off, with the moon rising over this ridge at this exact spot not just a happy accident! There's a consistency in the brightness from left to right that works well. I'd be interested to see the blue of the sky become a bit more muted towards the top of the image, and so steal the show a little less from the landscape.

A very clean and well shot image, possibly more architectural or cityscape than landscape, but certainly worthy of a Top 10 spot. Architecture is always pleasing in sunlight, with a blue sky, and everything is nice and sharp and well composed. I like the tight crop on the far left. The blues on the right of the image are a little over-processed for me and have started to look unnatural, although this is perhaps a matter of personal taste.