I pulled up a photo I had taken a few years ago and used it to see if I had learned anything about PP. The original was shot with a Nikon D7100 with a Nikkor VR 70-300mm f4.5-5 lens. I shot at 185mm, f8, 1/2000s and iso of 400. I processed the RAW file with PhotoNinja and finished off the resulting .tiff with GIMP. As I was processing the photo I noticed that there was a herd of mule deer at the treeline along the river. Serendipity!

Rawah Mountains CO

(Download)

Doddy, Thanks for your complements. I remember traveling through Glen Coe in 1989 and shooting film with a Pentax K1000. When I got home and developed them they were all underexposed. Even so they evoked a lot of emotion (Ghosts of the MacDonalds 1692?) and good memories. Wyoming and Colorado have the same feel to me. If you get a chance to go to Glen Coe please post your work, it is a truly magical place.

I really like the first photo, it seems so.....horsey and intimate. I agree with above, it is a little soft on focus but both a little contrast and light sharpening might work wonders. As a guess as to the softness of the first photo, it takes the auto-focus a split second to gain a lock on the subject. If you try try to snap the photo too quickly it can cause a soft focus. You have a good eye for the subject, so keep working on the other basics. All of us are constantly learning and the folks on this site have really good advice to help you along.

Sorry, I am new and am still learning the site. I thought that the rules said not to check the "Store Original" unless needed for specific purposes stated in the rules. Can you help me to understand a little more about this? I want to be as helpful as possible but yet not step on any toes. Thanks.

Here are a few pix from a several hour's journey from the Laramie Plains through Cameron pass and on to North Park.

Chimney Rock 1


Chimney Rock 2


Camern Pass


Steller's Jay


Park Range

Thanks for all of the warm greetings!

Thanks for a walk down memory lane. We lived in VA for some time and attracted some of the same birds to our feeder. God pix and thanks again.

I vote for Ring Necked. Good shot.

Thanks Mac, good shooting!

Wow, I was boasting a little in my comment about living in Wyoming. You also live in a place where spectacular photo opportunities abound. My wife and I visited Scotland in 1989 and lived in Llanelli, Wales and London for some months. Thanks for the greetings.

Glad to be part of this community. I live in Wyoming and find many opportunities to snap photos. I use a Nikon D7100 and find it a capable platform for most uses. I have attached a photo that provided me with a lovely surprise. I Shot in Raw (270mm, f9, 1/125 and iso 100) and postprocessed it with Photoninja, GIMP and a little HD with Fusion. As I was working with this photo I noticed that a herd of wild horses were transiting the photo in the distance so I cropped to show them bettter. Wonderful unplanned event but then photography often does include a little luck! Hope to join in as appropriate.

Wild Horses on Laramie Plains

This photo definitely appears to suffer from a focus issue. I believe that you used autofocus and then switched to manual. This lens can suffer from focus creep in manual so that may be a possibility. Another thing not mentioned is that when you are using a tripod you must turn off the image stabilization or it can introduce out of focus results. I have used this lens with a Nikon D7100 and got excellent results using about 500 mm and spot auto focus. Even at 600mm the shots are acceptable. I generally soot the moon underexposed about a stop or so and adjust in raw processing. Settings that work for me are ISO 100, f8 and 1/100.