Most people don't like photos that look 100% real. Could you imagine portrait shots that are not edited at all? IMO, editing photos is what makes people really appreciate them as they see things they recognize yet it looks new to them.
The first and second ones are definitely my favourites. I like the composition and leading lines in both. The second one looks a little underexposed to me and there is perhaps a tiny bit too much contrast but adjust that and it'll be a stunner. Sky looks good and the cloud formation looks dramatic which makes the photo interesting.
I'm not too hot on the third one but that's probably just the subject matter. Seems like there is too much contrast to me and it may be a little underexposed again (or just dark because of the contrast) but it looks like it's in focus, but again difficult to tell when looking at a resized version.
I prefer the fifth to the fourth - I think your composition in the fifth one is probably better. Sky looks fairly dramatic again and I like that but again too much contrast I think. You are right the white balance is perhaps a bit on the warm side, could try adjusting it to make it a tiny bit cooler but I don't think it's warm as you seem to think it is.
I can see what you've done in the sixth one - guess you could pass it off as a night shot if you didn't know it was taken in daylight.
And the final one is nice - I like how the pier enters the frame from the right and goes into the centre of the shot. Your composition is good and I like the tones in that one too. On my monitor it does seem perhaps a tiny bit underexposed though and the contrast seems quite high but you do get nice those nice blues in the sky as a result. What I tend to do to get nice blues in skies is play around with the tone curve and reduce the highlights, not increase the contrast.
I think the first, second and last are definitely my favourite photos because I prefer the subjects and I think your editing and composition are better in those shots.
Perhaps use the exposure brush to lighten up the dock, while keeping the sky dark?
The radial filter doesn't actually blur... more like separate. If you have Lightroom 5 have a play with the Radial Filter and see what you think.
. Gotta be technical . Yes I have have LR5 and I know exactly which brush you mean
It's in the RAW camera filter in Photoshop. Only available for RAW files (which I hope you use), or can be used on JPGs in the latest Photoshop CC update.
You said blur not filter
) and then I cleaned it up in Photoshop and made some tweaks in Lightroom 5.
'A Snowy Blast from the Past!' by JasonBrown2013, on Flickr
Wow what a coincidence! My family did come from Sweden and England though, so I guess my name is more common over thereThis photo was taken in 1972 by my grandfather (Geoff Johnson - obviously not the one on this forum! They just so happen to share the same name!) on an old slide transparency camera in Finland whilst cold-weather testing the Austin Allegro with British Leyland. Not sure what the make or model of the camera was.
The slide was scanned into the computer as a JPEG (hence for the quality loss in the upper right, that's probably because I had to edit a fairly low-res file - sorry, but not much I can do about that!
Wow what a coincidence! My family did come from Sweden and England though, so I guess my name is more common over there
Train in Winter by Geoff Johnson., on Flickr
Icicles by Geoff Johnson., on Flickr
Ice Castle at Dusk by Geoff Johnson., on Flickr
Icicles by Geoff Johnson., on Flickr
