Blazing Glory

by Lori Arnold
(Salt Lake City, Utah USA)

I love shooting at the Great Salt Lake, I am sure you have already noticed this by my submissions.

My last shoot was two weeks ago, and this is one of the photos from it. I think this photo gives a lot to ones’ imagination. It is mysterious, and yet inviting and warm.

Tell me your opinion!! Thanks Ed.


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This is indeed a great photo at the Great Salt Lake.

In photography it certainly helps if you have great subject matter to work with, as Lori does here. But there again, a good photographer will seek out interest, often in the most ordinary of places.

But I digress . . . Lori’s photo instantly grabs attention because of those wonderful colours in the sky. And it is here that I would offer an improvement.

The sky is clearly the subject here, yet it only takes up around a third of the photo. The remainder is the foreground which is too dark to reveal any real features.

My one tip for this photo is to consider the composition – using the rule of thirds as a guide. Raise the camera, aim to have the horizon on the lower horizontal of the rule of thirds grid, and then shoot.

This would give more space for that gorgeous sky, and would have reduced the amount of featureless shadow in the foreground. Click for more on the rule of thirds.

There is more I would suggest in the way of composition. It seems to me that the best part of this sunset is the orange glow on the left of the photo, yet this is the part that disappears out of the photo.

I think it would have improved the picture compositionally if Lori had rotated to the left a bit, to get the orange glow more in the centre of the photo.

Aside from the composition, there’s nothing more I would be tempted to do with this photo.

I hope there are a few tips here that are of use, and thanks Lori for the submission!

Ed.

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