Where Pray Tell

This is stunning, Brian! Love the warm light on the church contrasting with those dark moody clouds. Very nice comp with the church on the right backed by the mountains, facing toward the vast fields. A few thoughts: wish the light on the church was more uniform, possibly by just darkening the brightest area a bit. Also I like the strip of yellow flowers across the bottom but I think I would increase the saturation of them a bit to make them more noticeable. I bet this would work well as a stock photo marketed to religious organizations--lots of spiritual meanings could be read into this image.

Brian, I like this a lot. The clouds are a bit overwhelming. Carolyn has made some excellent suggestions. I would add cropping to a pano by cropping out about half the overhead clouds. Also, I would back off the sharpening. There is a sharpening halo on the sea horizon and the silhouette of the mountain.

Thanks for the feedback Carolyn and Phil...some great suggestions. I've brightened and boosted saturation a bit on the flowers, worked to reduce brightness on the spotlight on the front of the church, adjusted the aspect ratio slightly, and knocked the sharpening down a bit. I still feel the church brightness might be on the edge, but it seems to be in control and more uniform.
Brian

Brian,

This is awesome! Once I figured out the church was artificially lit (the sun direction doesn't match...) ;-) it all makes sense. Great job with the processing to enhance the mood; dark skies like this are pretty common, so all is believable here. Nice job with the tweaks in the repost, although personally I would keep the sky and not crop. I think the sense of isolation is better with more sky, but YMMV.

Wonderful M&N image.

Lon

Great light. The lighting on the church is very effective and excellent overall scene. Hard to believe that is 2am. Jeez.

I agree with Lon about keeping the sky.

Wonderful image! I like everything about it, and agree with Lon about keeping the sky as it has a strong presence in the scene and helps make the image what it is.

Very cool find. Nice :)

aF

This is extraordinary, Brian; the lighting on the church is fantastic, contrasting as it does with the ominous sky. I do like your repost but as Harley and Lon suggested, keep the sky as in the original post. That sky greatly heightens the sense of the remoteness of this church, which from your description, drew you to make this image. One superb image.

This is a gorgeous shot, Brian!! I like the comp in the original post, as the sky adds dimension to the comp, in my opinion. Love the visible crosses in the back of the church too. Sure coveys a story… Well done, my friend!!!