Jim, Rpcrowe and Gengiant,

Thanks for all your comments. Everyone has been really helpful. I also had not noticed that I cut the frame in half with the horizon - another reason for the shots to be much more bland than the scenery.

I need to remember that large beautiful vistas only do well if you establish a composition that is interesting.

Thanks again.

Dave

I like the first shot more than the second. I think that the first is pretty good. Witht he first one I think one aspect that could help would be if you had been able to get more detail in the maountains in the background, more color in them instead of being darker. You could try a graduated or split nuetral density filter and put the ND side on the sky. The dificulty in this is finding the right ammount of darkening strength. I recently puchased such a filter and I like the results, but I wish I had gotten a little darker of one. The cactus in the foreground also lloks almost artificialy lit. Did you use a flash? They seem to have this odd glow that just looks out of place. This is even more so the case in the second photo. In the second photo I think I would move in closer to leave out more of the bluew sky.

Kyle Reynolds

Dave have you thought of maybe abandoning the wide angle here and focusing on one element with this spectacular background. So for instance different DoF could work - just have one element of the foreground in focus and leave the rest blurred? I don't know whether that would work but it's just a thought I always have when I see wide angle landscapes.

Those two are good pictures tho - all they need is a point of interest to make them absolutely amazing. Very few landscapes have that tho, so I think overall you did a pretty good job here anyway!