Dry2

[choronr]

Refer to the earlier image I posted.

[FrankB]

There's that barely noticable voice in my mind that tell's me to prefer this image over the other ;-)

Kidding aside, it's a nice image, for which I still would have a few suggestions.
For one, there are little brighter "splotches" on the dunes. I think that's a surface layer with a too intense fractal breakup, with too much sharpness and feature scales. I think it would look better if color variation on the dunes would be very very soft.
You might also want to try to reduce the size of the larger fake stones and also give them a little displacement.
Lastly, if you add soft shadows, that would be a nice final touch.
Oh, and it *may* help with the overall dynamics, if either the sky or the ground would be brighter than the other. For now, both sky and land are equally bright, although one would think that with so much sky and white clouds, either the ground shouls be darker or the sky slightly over-exposed.

Other than that - the cloud looks like a long awaited blessing for the dry landscape. Let's hope it won't just travel by :-)

Cheers,
Frank

[schmeerlap]

Great improvement in clouds compared to your Reflect (uploaded in Rendo) image. A bit more contrast may give them more definition. I see the lighter splotches far left that FrankB was referring to. Maybe give that layer (child layer) different slope constraints rather than breakup to avoid patchy effect. I think you're just about there with your cumulo endeavours.

John

[rcallicotte]

I agree this is better, especially the lighting in the clouds.  But, I think their edges are too sharp.

[choronr]

There's that barely noticable voice in my mind that tell's me to prefer this image over the other ;-)

Kidding aside, it's a nice image, for which I still would have a few suggestions.
For one, there are little brighter "splotches" on the dunes. I think that's a surface layer with a too intense fractal breakup, with too much sharpness and feature scales. I think it would look better if color variation on the dunes would be very very soft.
You might also want to try to reduce the size of the larger fake stones and also give them a little displacement.
Lastly, if you add soft shadows, that would be a nice final touch.
Oh, and it *may* help with the overall dynamics, if either the sky or the ground would be brighter than the other. For now, both sky and land are equally bright, although one would think that with so much sky and white clouds, either the ground shouls be darker or the sky slightly over-exposed.

Other than that - the cloud looks like a long awaited blessing for the dry landscape. Let's hope it won't just travel by :-)

Cheers,
Frank

Now this is an excellent critique; and, the kind that may yield deeper thought while creating images. This is what I like about this forum - a sharing pool of expertise. Thanks Frank for taking the time to analyze the picture; and, your suggestions are well taken. I will go over your remedies and try the adjustments; thank you.

Bob   

[sanosoke]

Hi Bob,

I hope you don't mind some criticism.
I think in general this is a nice image and has a lot of potential.

I would first suggest sticking more to the rule of thirds. Move the camera a little to the left so that the whole tree is fully in view, but still in the lower left hand corner.
I would also do something about the repeating pattern in the sand, that is a little distracting.

The next thing is just a suggestion. I would say that if you had a huge looming mountain in the distance, acting kind of as these big clouds it would be even more effective, stretching out the view a bit to give more depth, and basically just adding another dimension to the piece.
Then I think doing a kind of sunset/twilight atmo, like your first one but more subtle would really do the trick.

Just my thoughts,
Sacha

[choronr]

Hi Bob,

I hope you don't mind some criticism.
I think in general this is a nice image and has a lot of potential.

I would first suggest sticking more to the rule of thirds. Move the camera a little to the left so that the whole tree is fully in view, but still in the lower left hand corner.
I would also do something about the repeating pattern in the sand, that is a little distracting.

The next thing is just a suggestion. I would say that if you had a huge looming mountain in the distance, acting kind of as these big clouds it would be even more effective, stretching out the view a bit to give more depth, and basically just adding another dimension to the piece.
Then I think doing a kind of sunset/twilight atmo, like your first one but more subtle would really do the trick.

Just my thoughts,
Sacha

Thanks sacha; I'm glad we all have different tastes - otherwise, our images would look all the same.