Nothing Left to Sell + R x2

Wow!  What a powerful story this seemingly simple image tells us.  Perhaps the cloudy sky could be made a little more powerful but that is a minor nit.  However, the story comes through anyway.

Marylynne, this does a great job of capturing, the rolling land, a bit of history, and the big sky of the Palouse (or any other high prairie).  While you could tone down the overall brightness just a bit for some extra pop, this does a very good job of capturing the bright open feeling of the prairie.  The abandoned farm is the story of much of the rural western USA.

Very appealing image, and a very sad commentary on the demise of  US farms and farming.  
Sandy

Hi Folks,
Thanks for the feedback on this one.  I have added some contrast and saturation to the sky, a bit more than I think is advisable, but I would love feedback on that.  I think something in between the two might be best for the sky.  I wanted to keep it someone light and airy, as if the investment were evaporating, but perhaps I'm taking the story and the A. Wyeth parallels too far.
ML

I must admit I have not spent much time in the gallery, but very pleased that I found your image of the old home.I see why you refer this to Wyeth, it does have that feel to it.  I like both versions, but tend to favor the second one.  A story telling photo.  Did you take any horizontal photos of this scene?  I wonder how this would look as a horizontal scene, maybe even a pano.  Thanks for sharing.

Thanks for commenting, John.  I do have a couple of horizontal crops, but only one from a similar angle as the first.  Here it is for comparison and further suggestions. 

There were a couple of challenges with going horizontal: the road goes by to the left, and because of the brown patch of grass, I felt like the image should face left, so to speak.  The other issue was the stringy clouds.  I struggled to to find clouds that worked at the top of the image, so letting them evaporate up there made more sense.  Maybe it is because of the crop, but the house feels less alone in this version.  Do others get that feeling?
ML 

 

I'm glad I ran into this one, MaryIynne. I think your original posting is the best. I thought the soft pastel colors needed some vibrance or saturation, but after viewing the revisits  the soft effect works best for me. The slightly OOF in the  foreground works nicely and brings the house structure into even more prominence. The vertical image placing the house under the bigger sky is more effective and tells the story of time and change on the prairie.  

The horizontal is the ticket for me. The colors seem a bit softer and the house is bigger.

I really like the horizontal version Marylynne.  The soft pastel colors are delightful.

Thanks for all of the feedback, everyone.  I can see the split between vertical and horizontal appreciation here.  I am doing one more horizontal (I have a real problem with the cloud at the top edge and the cut off cloud on the left in the horizontal images).  In this one, I cropped lower and did some work to the cloud on the left, but I'm thinking the clouds are still a problem.  Any thoughts on whether they distract you all would be much appreciado!
ML

Thanks for posting the horizontal images.  I think both are fine, but tend to like the second one best.  I do like the horizontal format over the vertical.  Both formats are fine images.