Grand Canyon and Northern Arizona - Day Two

We made it to the South Rim. A lot of dappled light and light snow. It was about 33 degrees so it didn't stick much, but with a bit of wind it was chilly. I am a firm believer that you work with whatever weather you are dealt. Very tricky shooting and am not settled on the processing of these as I want to keep them atmospheric and adding detail via Dehaze destroys the feel. So here is a balance of different ways I attempted to represent what I felt on this day.

Fuji XT5


















7 images stitched

9


9 images stitched.

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Paul

aChanceEncounter said:

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This one is nice and interesting. I'd probably warm the land a little more similar to some of the others you posted while masking off the sky. Looks like you captured virga there.

I also like the one Mike pointed out best. To me is the best composition and you really see the mist/low cloud well. Positive dehaze would definitely kill this one.

All of the ones with the low clouds visible inside the canyon are interesting but I find most of the time shots taken from the top of the South Rim while always good often are lacking in composition.

I found it tough shooting.

aChanceEncounter said:

I found it tough shooting.

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If you're referring to framing the landscape, I believe Matt's reply is probably spot on. Without sniping the landscape with longer lenses the Grand Canyon rim shots typically lack much good composition. Your Grand Canyon shots are quite different than your other post of images you took in and near Monument Valley which all are benefitting from nice compositions.

I was surprised how quickly the snow could come and go, both in falling and on the ground (I live near Los Angeles, so snow is not my usual winter experience.). When I was there my winter trip, the "weather" came in a couple of bands of storms, heavy weather, then almost clear skies, then back to clouds and snow. It took some time in processing to get "color" I thought was right and consistent.

New edit - added texture overlay - I think it might work better with a little painterly feel. Also, I think it looks better when viewed on my 72" TV





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Paul

Still working on the post of these images. Is this better/stronger?







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Paul

Was there more than "texture" changed? I tried a/b comparisons on 2 tabs. I didn't like what the texture did, giving bumps, etc. but it looked also to have more saturation or color, darker in dark areas, lighter in light, too? That looked beter, to me.

I like this more than some of the others. I'd try cropping it some. Take off some of the foreground and right side, emphasizing the upper left 2/3rds or so?

aChanceEncounter said:

Still working on the post of these images. Is this better/stronger?

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To me the most interesting part is that middle 1/3, me personally I wouldn't be scared to add a lot more drama to this image through some very intentional dodging and burning, especially darkening the foreground to draw more attention to that 1/3 middle area where all the drama is and even possibly some more cropping in.

Just a personal note, based on the beauty of the compositions and subjects of the images you have been posting your talent / photographic eye seems to eclipse that 16-80 lens you are using which is notorious for being so-so and not really sharp. It has creates a conundrum of needing to be stopped down enough to reduce the unsharpness while not being able to be stopped down enough because of introducing diffraction.

I believe you are using a 40mp sensor, that first image is really nice but it suffers greatly in clarity from what I would expect from that sensor size, looks like you shot it at F11 which is getting into the diffraction problem too, most people don't recommend shooting with that lens beyond f8. Just something to consider based on how nice your photography ability is.

Thanks. I shot full frame for several decades and wanted a much lighter setup. Normally i shoot on a travel tripod with my small geared head where i can concentrate on comp. For my portraits i use primes Generally i only use small aperture for intentional flaring I bet i graded a shot to edit that was bracketed. This lens is indeed best at 5.6 But it does make a good travel lens and is very close focusing. I find canyons tough. I had similar challenges at the black canyon of the gunnison

These are beautiful! Great job of getting your setting right.