Hole in the Sky + repost

Very nice sky here Nancy. I like how you used the foreground stump to anchor the scene. My only suggestion would be to open up the shadows a bit since the distant ridge seems a little dark to me. I might also experiment with cropping from the right to exclude the really bright portion of the sky...my eye seems the be instantly drawn to the URC.

Nice! I love the way the light is catching the flowers! The only thing that bothers me slightly is that the sky seems to be a little too blue in the hole....over-saturated slightly perhaps?

So that's where my clouds went, Nancy!! I'm glad you got to enjoy them but I must admit to being a little jealous.

On scenes like this it is difficult to capture the entire dynamic range in a single exposure. Many photographers now blend multiple exposures in photoshop but if you are not comfortable with that this is a perfect scene for a graduated neutral density filter since the horizon line is relatively flat. I would recommend a soft graduated filter which has a soft edge in the transition from dark to light. Using a filter with a soft edge would avoid darkening the distant hillside any further and would balance the dynamic range in the scene.

If you look at buying a grad filter a bit of advice would be to make sure the filter is truly neutral density otherwise it may introduce an unwanted color cast in the image. I think the Cokin filters are known to introduce a color cast although they are usually inexpensive. Lee and Singh Ray make excellent filters but they are generally fairly expensive - about $100-200 in price. You can either purchase a holder (the Cokin P holder is most common and is inexpensive) or you can hand hold the filter in front of the lens. If you decide to handhold the filter it is easier to hand hold the larger filters (ie: 4X6).

Lovely sky, though seems a bit "gloppy" instead of having fine detail that is more often the case with clouds. The off-centered placement of the stump in the foreground works quite nicely.

Nancy Lea, definitely an awesome skyscape. I love the flow in the clouds leading to the bits of blue sky and how they're positioned above the stump and near the 1/3 line. Personally I'd like to see some more detail in the stump and in the distant ridge.

Raise the shadows a bit and this will be awesome!

Trying another with less shadows. Looking better I think.