uniquely singapore

[denniskee]

shoot with 40d + 17-40, manual mode.

waited for the boat to reach this point to shoot.

looking for critique on

1) composition in perticular the placement of horizon and boat.
2) would it have been better if its the duck tour or the wooden boat (aka river taxi)?
3) does the vignette (original no vignette, i pp to add it in) work for you?

[Yapster]

Originally Posted by denniskee shoot with 40d + 17-40, manual mode. waited for the boat to reach this point to shoot. looking for critique on 1) composition in perticular the placement of horizon and boat. 2) would it have been better if its the duck tour or the wooden boat (aka river taxi)? 3) does the vignette (original no vignette, i pp to add it in) work for you?

My view on your request for critique:

1) Yup, it work for me. I guess this area here is pretty hard to compose with everything in the background. Maybe full frame will help a little?

2)Hmm, i would prefer the wooden sampan though. But i guess your focus of this shot is more on the landscape in the background?

3) Hehe, i like to use vignetting. So it works for me as well.

The only nitpick is, hmm, maybe can try to tell us why this shot represent "Uniquely Singapore"?

Hmm, it is the mixture of Old and New?

Here's a shot of mine 10 months back. But my background hmm, couldn't get a full view of Singapore Flyer. Was comparing the construction and singapore flyer (new) Vs the Sampan (Old).

My Take

Let me know if you want me to remove it.

[LittleWolf]

Originally Posted by denniskee 1) composition in perticular the placement of horizon and boat.

The horizon is a bit low for my taste. The boat is pretty close to the bottom of the picture, but at the top there's mostly empty sky. Just cropping away a bit of the sky makes it look better, IMHO.

Now, I don't know if this is supposed to be an "aesthetic" or a "documentary" photo. From an aesthetic viewpoint, I find the background very cluttered and plain ugly. From a documentary POV, the clutter may be representative of Singapore, but then I feel it should be more prominent, not just relegated to the background.

Quote: 3) does the vignette (original no vignette, i pp to add it in) work for you?

No offense, but to me it doesn't look good at all.

In a way, the picture is very contradictory. Plain water in the foreground, clutter in the background. "Idyllic" boat scene, ugly concrete & plastic structure + steel girders behind. Screaming colours of the digital age, but 19th century vignette. It just doesn't match up.

[cheguthamrin]

Whats so unique, actually?
Boat / river / construction / bridge / colourful stadium seats can be found anywhere everywhere else in any other country. Except the flyer of course, then the main subject should have been the flyer.

[night86mare]

Originally Posted by denniskee 1) composition in perticular the placement of horizon and boat. 2) would it have been better if its the duck tour or the wooden boat (aka river taxi)? 3) does the vignette (original no vignette, i pp to add it in) work for you?

1) not too bad. prefer the horizon and boat to be closer though, i.e. use longer lens, take when the boat is still further away. since the routes are generally quite standard you definitely have a chance to reshoot.

2) the duck tour boat is hideous. not sure about wooden boat.

3) no. it is too little here, so it looks like a half-baked attempt

[denniskee]

Originally Posted by LittleWolf In a way, the picture is very contradictory. Plain water in the foreground, clutter in the background. "Idyllic" boat scene, ugly concrete & plastic structure + steel girders behind. Screaming colours of the digital age, but 19th century vignette. It just doesn't match up.

interesting view you have here. pardon my poor understanding of english, do you mean

1) vignetting and modern photography doesnt match or photos taken with digital medium?
2) this rich colors can also be reproduce by slides, so do you mean vignetting will be ok than?
3) depending on lens used, photos taken dslr and compact digital can also produce vignetting if filters are used. than how?

appreciate if you can explain further. thanks.

[LittleWolf]

Originally Posted by denniskee 1) vignetting and modern photography doesnt match or photos taken with digital medium?

The extreme vignetting (i.e. going beyond the natural cos^4 vignetting) of old photos is a technical flaw of the less advanced lens designs. What is in your picture is a pretty strong/abrupt vignette, like what one would get from using a too narrow lens hood. Re-introducing an image fault digitally without a good reason doesn't make much sense to me. I just don't see how adding this special effect to an already cluttered and colourful image helps it.

Quote: 2) this rich colors can also be reproduce by slides, so do you mean vignetting will be ok than?

As a side note, in 20 years of predominantly shooting slides, I've very rarely had such extremely saturated colours as are popular now with the digital crowd. (Disclaimer: I didn't use Velvia.)

If you physically vignette during exposure,the result is physically/mathematically consistent. When you do it in Photoshop or a similar program, it is not so easy to get it right in colour - you need to pay a lot of attention to transfer curves to get it to look natural. (Unless you do all your editing in linear colour coordinates.)

Quote: 3) depending on lens used, photos taken dslr and compact digital can also produce vignetting if filters are used. than how?

If you use suitable filters, you won't get noticeable additional vignetting. On the other hand, deliberately blocking the periphery of the image e.g. with a cardboard cutout or a too narrow lens hood is rather unconventional.

[xl1]

Brooo... finaly 40D huh? i like this shoot, esp the composition, you just get the right time to get those clear blue sky! As for the boat, of course Duck boat looks more unique if you put the title unique singapore

and last thing vignette is works for me, its not to deep nor to thin

i love it!

[dingzyangz]

1) the boat is too near the bottom and resulted it to be to heavy bottom.. and being so near at the bottom, if your aperture is not small enough the DoF isn't enough thus the background appeared kind of soft.

2) definitely the wooden boat for me! cos it is nostalgic. haha.

3) doesn't really make a difference here... but i guess can do without it. unless if you turn it to a b/w pic maybe it will help more.

Originally Posted by denniskee shoot with 40d + 17-40, manual mode. waited for the boat to reach this point to shoot. looking for critique on 1) composition in perticular the placement of horizon and boat. 2) would it have been better if its the duck tour or the wooden boat (aka river taxi)? 3) does the vignette (original no vignette, i pp to add it in) work for you?

guess we should just stick to the 3 pts the TS wants critiques on.

Originally Posted by cheguthamrin Whats so unique, actually? Boat / river / construction / bridge / colourful stadium seats can be found anywhere everywhere else in any other country. Except the flyer of course, then the main subject should have been the flyer.

[denniskee]

thanks littlewolf for taking time to explain.

Originally Posted by dingzyangz 3) doesn't really make a difference here... but i guess can do without it. unless if you turn it to a b/w pic maybe it will help more.

ur suggestion if match with littlewolf's view on the vignetting

will give it a try.


ok, i just tried. dont like it because it looses some punch due to the color lost.

maybe it works better if it is the wooden boat (aka river taxi) instead.

[cheguthamrin]

Originally Posted by dingzyangz guess we should just stick to the 3 pts the TS wants critiques on.

My apologies. I've only this point that I agree:

Originally Posted by night86mare 1) not too bad. prefer the horizon and boat to be closer though, i.e. use longer lens, take when the boat is still further away. since the routes are generally quite standard you definitely have a chance to reshoot.

You could have taken more shots to show the boats from different distances to make comparison. The emptiness between the boat now, and the horizon doesnt quite work for me.

Personally, I rather have this boat than the bumboat - wooden ones - cos the colour here is a good contrast to the blue sea.

[denniskee]

i would like to explain why i didnt take the shot when the boat was further back
1) the flyer would have appear more flatten if i still want to shoot in portrait orientation, ie i will be shooting from more to my right from where i took this shot. doing this will also include more water way between me and the boat and also more sky.

else, if i take the shoot from where i was standing, it would have forced me to shoot in landscape orientation, but there will be to much water gap between the background and the boat.

2) i wanted to shoot more of a top down view of the boat and to include more color, ie the yellow by taking this shot.


next the type of boat
1) yes, maybe the duck tour boat fit the title better.

2) the wooden boat has less color, so maybe have to convert to b&w?
but it is kind of new (flyer) vs old (wooden boat).

3) this boat is the latest addition to the river tour industrial, matching nicely to the flyer.
it is more of a "open concept" ride like it counter-part the hippo bus ride.
if i am not wrong, it is able to rearrange the seats to meet the needs of their customer if they book the ride. ie customization, the next step forward for hospitality industrial.
for this, i think calling it uniquely singapore also can lar.


last the vignetting
1) i think it is more of a personal preferrence.

2) i imagine it should work better if the boat is wooden type plus conversion to b&w.


I really appreciate the inputs, please keep them coming. thanks.

[night86mare]

i'm going to ask why you are asking for critique if your only reaction is to spend precious time defending your photo from critique.

[grumpy]

Only the vignette doesnt work for me. The rest is ok.

And I think you will not be able to get the same shot/same position with the Duck, as I dun think it will get into that position.

[denniskee]

Originally Posted by night86mare i'm going to ask why you are asking for critique if your only reaction is to spend precious time defending your photo from critique.

u mis-understood liao lar. i not defending, just sharing my thought after reading the critique, like summerizing like that.

as you can see, i also tried to convert to b&w as per dingzyangz's recommendation combine with littlewolf's also. but the result from my own view is not very nice with this boat. will go back to try to shoot 1 with wooden boat instead and pp it.

i also agree that duck tour maybe also suitable.

[sircheezeball]

I don't think any ordinary viewer (that includes me) will realize that it's a duck-tour boat...

[Override2Zion]

Just my preferences, others may beg to differ. To me, its already a nice picture
1) The composition works for me, Singapore flyer on the upper-left thirds and boat on the bottom right.
2) I would prefer the wooden boat for that scene, think it fits better in that colour process. Perhaps a good contrast between modern and traditional singapore. Just a thought
3) The vignetting works for me, a little more of it would be nice too