Long exposure with beach rocks

[mperko]

I'm very happy with the technical details of this shot like the exposure and focal length, and the detail captured, but I'm just a bit unsure about the composition. I battled with this at the time I took it. There were a zillion ways to frame this, with so many rocks in different formations. I settled on this composition at the time and I have had a love/hate relationship with it ever since.

Your thoughts? Does it engage you, or is the composition confusing?

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3595/3374185435_eab9662d9e_o.jpg

[Hertz van Rental]

The composition is determined by what you want the image to do.
It's about relationships and visual dynamics - whether you want a sense of movement or a sense of calm, and where you want peoples' eyes to go.
There are those who would say that the horizon is in the wrong place. That it should be exactly one third down the frame. But it's fine where it is - the amount of sky balances the rocks at the bottom.
You have the object in the bottom left corner with a diagonal leading back into frame (the line of the rocks) which keeps the eye interested. So that's OK.
But where the image falls down - in my opinion at any rate (so feel free to ignore me) - is in two key points.
Firstly, there are waves in the sea so it is not calm, but by doing a long exposure you have smoothed them out where they are breaking on the rocks.
Now the rocks are quite dynamic as they are largely aligned from bottom right towards top left with a rising angle on most of them as if they are thrusting up out of the sea.
And there is the quite strong curve of the channel between the two main lines of rocks.
This all gives a feeling of energy and motion.
But the smoothed out sea works against this.
If you had allowed the waves to show by using a shorter exposure then there would have been even more energy in the picture and the viewer would have a sense of the power of the sea.
As it stands the effect is a bit bland.
The removal of the interaction between the sea and rocks has removed any focus the picture might have had so you look at it but your eye never really settles on anything.
The other problem I have with it is that it looks somewhat over-cooked in post-processing. It's lost the raw immediacy that photography usually gives things and replaced it with an almost painterly quality. Which unfortunately enhances the flatness of the image even more.
Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying it's a bad picture. It is, in actual fact, quite a nice image. But it could have been so much more.
And I think this is why you are unsure about the image. It's not the composition - it's the flatness of it.
I'm sure others will think it wonderful - although at the end of the day if you like it that's all that matters.
But think about what I've said and see if you don't agree with me just a little bit ;)

[mperko]

I have gone back several times and looked at the image including the raw file, and really thought about what you said. You made a very valid point about the smoothness and lack of crashing waves. I wish I had taken one with a shorter exposure. My purpose for the long exposure was to reveal more of the rocks and call attention to them, and give an eerie calmness to the image. I think I achieved that, and I think the post processing, of which there is little, helps that. Honestly I think what I was trying to achieve would have been more noticeable had there been more waves, so much so that even with the long exposure you could still see their movement. As it is here, it was a fairly calm evening, so the wave action is very diminished by the exposure.

I hope to see conditions like this again so I can try some different exposures. Unfortunately, the sky is rarely this cloudy and stormy in Santa Barbara so it may be a while.

Thanks for your words. I'll keep them in mind when I try this again.

[Hertz van Rental]

My purpose for the long exposure was to reveal more of the rocks and call attention to them, and give an eerie calmness to the image.

In that case the long exposure could work - maybe even using a longer exposure if possible.
But you would need to re-compose to bring the focus onto the rocks.
A much higher PoV perhaps, and less sky.
The way it is now, the sky balances the foreground pretty much - and it's quite busy. This takes some attention away from the rocks.
If you want them to be the focus of attention then you have to stop other things competing for attention. Less detail in the sky would help.
As the picture stands, the interest - and the viewers attention - is spread all over the image. This is not too much of a problem if it's the whole view that is the subject.
But if you want us to concentrate one just one thing then you have to use all the other elements to lead us there or not have them competing too much.