The changing face of Cumbria 1.0.0

I was interested in the show as I know the Lake District reasonably well and it was a change to see more of the high country. As a complete presentation I feel that it stands up pretty well, however there were some areas which I personally think could be improved.

1. The heavy black masking at the beginning and end was too heavy, maybe a vertical wipe form bottom to top at the beginning would work better and in reverse at the end.

2. As noted by another review the third image was maybe a little over used.

3. There is a distinct lack of sharpness in a few images.

4. Some Photoshop artefacts have crept in on a couple of images.

5. Generally the music was reasonable nothing really jarred with the images but towards the end the music got a bit more dramatic and would have suited an image of a waterfall or a a rocky dramatic landscape instead of a tranquil lake scene.

Please remember this is a personal impression of the show and maybe not everyone else will agree.

One final comment about using photoshop that I use when judging " I don't mind the use of Photoshop to enhance an image but I don't want to see obvious joins"

Regards John

PS. Have put this in as a review as there appeared to be no response to it in the comments section.

Perhaps the reason few people comment on slideshows is cowardice and I include myself in that category too. Whoever makes the first comment, to some degree they set the scene and because no one likes to feel isolated or out of step,  there can be a tendency for others to follow the crowd. If the next views are contrary to those already expressed and perhaps not so positive, the pressure is strong to back away from making any comment, unless its positive.  Another issue is that to make really good comments, it  takes time.  Perhaps all it needs is one or two of us to step in and make honest comment and others may then follow.  However, what will kill this stone dead is what has been seen on forums like this (in the past, not now) and is rife on social media right now. A contrary opinion needs to be respected, but quite often it isn't and others then gang up on those who have made a comment they don't agree with.

My comments: This sequence is a pictorial slideshow and its pleasant to view. The music is fine and matches the pace nicely, but would I watch it again or recommend it? Probably not. The sequence depends primarily on the images, but in my view there are not enough of them and it leans too heavily on technique.  If your going to use Photoshop techniques, I want to see them a little better executed. I know you have to start somewhere, but what we can get away with in a single image is not quite the same as a sequence of images.

I don't see this show as being dominated by the third image. I feel its better described as a series of composites. The start of a slide show is where you set the scene for your audience, but here the first image is probably the worst in the sequence. The eye is drawn straight away to the bottom right corner, where there is a host of processing errors and they are isolated against black, which makes those errors stand out. If the viewer sees these issues in the first 3 images, it doesn't bode well for the rest of the show.  If we are not careful is can colour our judgement.

The impression I have is that you wanted to make a slideshow. but really didn't have quite enough images of sufficient variety and you turned to technique to stretch them out and (I've been there too) it hasn't worked that well in my view.  

Excellent use of image blending but for me it was a third image done to death. But great photography and good representation of the beautiful scenery in Cumbria.

Neat use of image blending! Nice work Tom