Camel Rock a.k.a. Taitomo Island

SkyViking (Rolf) · #1 26-07-2010, 02:27 PM

Hi everyone, inspired in particular by H's spectacular vistas I have been experimenting with some landscape photography lately, and thought I might as well post a couple of the results here.

This is an image of 'Camel Rock' a.k.a. Taitomo Island at the southern end of Piha Beach on Auckland's west coast. To make the island itself stand out I stacked approximately 100 frames to achieve the smoothed effect of the waves. This was then combined with an HDR image of the island itself, processed with Photomatix Pro.
Local time was around 11am, so the light was quite strong and unforgiving, however this particular rock presents itself beautifully at all times.

Full size image: http://www.pbase.com/rolfolsen/image/124618149

All comments and critique is welcome.

Regards,
Rolf

bloodhound31 · #2 26-07-2010, 07:13 PM

WHOA! I can't decide if it's a three metre mound of dirt a few metres away with some grass and moss on it, or a massive island a couple of hundred metres high, covered in trees and a kilometer away...

Vanda (Ian) · #3 26-07-2010, 08:44 PM

Bit bland for me. Perhaps increasing the % of foreground to get rid of some of the dull sky would improve it. I prefer distant landscapes to emphasise the sky or the earth by giving one of them 75% of the picture. If you give the sky 75% that usually means some drama such as clouds, storm or setting sun etc. My opinion - there are exceptions.

SkyViking (Rolf) · #4 31-07-2010, 10:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bloodhound31

WHOA! I can't decide if it's a three metre mound of dirt a few metres away with some grass and moss on it, or a massive island a couple of hundred metres high, covered in trees and a kilometer away...

It's something in between, around 50m high I'd say. It's a beautiful spot with pretty much 360 degrees views.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vanda

Bit bland for me. Perhaps increasing the % of foreground to get rid of some of the dull sky would improve it. I prefer distant landscapes to emphasise the sky or the earth by giving one of them 75% of the picture. If you give the sky 75% that usually means some drama such as clouds, storm or setting sun etc. My opinion - there are exceptions.

Thanks for your comments Ian. I wanted to emphasise the rocky island, hence the stacking of the waves to achieve the smooth effect. It's an experimental image, so l may compose it differently next time