What's wrong with that picture? It is fake, that is what is wrong. Sorry to do this but I have issues with "photographers" who doctor up their images to gain dramatic, but fake, effects. Allow me to explain with an imaged that has been "doctored" But before I do that, we photographers live by ethics that no images should be doctored to perceive that which is not real. But not everyone lives with that unwritten rule.
OK, the image. The image color is false, basically over saturated to increase the drama. The golden hue is representing two parts of the day that are the best for photography; early morning and late evening. We call that the golden hour. That time when the sun casts a golded hue. However, that hue does not color cast like in the image. The human eye can discern the hue but most cameras cannot. The camera will compensate for the "lack of light" and allow more light to be collected on the film or sensor. This to achieve a properly exposed image. For this image, it would have been a bright, low contrast image.
Next, the image has been cropped to get rid of the clutter. That is OK in some instances. In this case, I am OK with the crop.
So here are my three examples to show what I mean.
First image was a rainbow that popped up while I was working on my antenna. What my eye saw and what my camera recorded are two different things.
I saw a very bright and colorful rainbow. So I got my camera and took a shot before the rainbow faded. This was the better of the shots I took. Not very impressive I must add.
Next I decided to get rid of the clutter in the image and enhance the rainbow color. That was acheived by cropping and then over saturating so the colors stood out. More dramatic.
The trees are green and the top of the houses show solar panels which would not be very useful on a rainy day. Better but not dramatic enough.
So, I decided to add a false "golden hour" effect by reducing the exposure. Now we are talking dramatic. The colors of the rainbow stand out. The contrast is makes it look like early evening when the sun is going down. The hue is golden. A Pulitzer prize winning image. NOT!
This is what my eye saw. Now as dark as it may seem but the colors and brightness of the rainbow. I was so stunded at the beauty of the colors and definition of the seperation of colors. Very rare. I see rainbows all the time, but not like this one. So I decided to "doctor" the image to make it more dramatic.
I believe that BoatUS did the community a disservice by selecting an image as the winner when it was doctored. Again, I have no issue with the cropping, but the colorization of the orange hue is so obvious. My guess is the photo was taken with a cell phone and "fixed"
This is my opinion and only that. I could be wrong, but I don't think I am that far off of what is seen in the picture. Many will not care and will see it as an ooh-aah moment. In this case it is. But when I looked at the other photos in the zine before I through it away, I saw much better, and real, images that should have won.
Just my 2¢ worth.