SDN Photo-a-Day (Rules updates - read the OP)

[Simplicius]

This tree will be dead and on a dump truck by Monday.

If your schedule permits, there might be some good pictures to be had at the removal.

Phone! Remember kids, bring a camera. I'll keep repeating it until I remember it.

That's okay, no-one needs to know.

[Bounty]

If your schedule permits, there might be some good pictures to be had at the removal.

I'd rather not be there. Personal reasons.

That's okay, no-one needs to know.

I was actually more interested in the light on the left when I shot it, but the phone only has an automatic mode and it doth protested quite a bit. This was the only shot it even wanted to take, I had to turn 45° because the others come out as error messages due to "unknown light conditions".

By the way, are you hinting I'm overdoing the black and white thing?

[Simplicius]

I was actually more interested in the light on the left when I shot it, but the phone only has an automatic mode and it doth protested quite a bit. This was the only shot it even wanted to take, I had to turn 45° because the others come out as error messages due to "unknown light conditions".

Photographing light is like painting color. The magic happens when good light is illuminating something/ in just the right way.

By the way, are you hinting I'm overdoing the black and white thing?

I thought it looked stronger in black and white, seeing as how there are already some very bold blacks in it. You're taking to the classic European b&w + rangefinder look whether you mean to or not; there might be some profit in looking up some of those photographers and seeing if they appeal to you.



This is an old picture that is basically a thoughtless snap, like everything else I took back then. Is there anything generally appealing about it, or it it just vaguely reminding me of something else?

[The Grim Squeaker]

It's not really interesting.
The same shot at sunset/sunrise/evening/morning with only the left chairs in the shot from a lower angle would be very nice (and you've probably seen something similiar)

[Bounty]

Is there anything generally appealing about it, or it it just vaguely reminding me of something else?

(EDIT: may be rambling)

First thought: where's the people?

It's a picture where you almost automatically start painting in people. Empty seats, empty boat, empty canoe, empty lake - it's a strong visual because, I think, it's a "still life" picture composed as a "people shot". Maybe because you have items that all have a sense of direction - you can, in a sense, follow the eye line of a chair or a boat as if it's in use even when there's nobody there.

And then there's the whole subtext of sea, sailing, not coming back and forever waiting, but that may be taking it too far.

Apart from that it's a nice, soothing location. It's a very calm picture with a bit of a vacation-y, living-on-the-Riviera feel, shot with a nice balance of features (anchored in the quay below, boats in the middle-foreground, trees to break up the horizon which dovetail nicely with the mast). It's one of those pictures that's not a stand-out but just does everything okay, and it's nice to look at.

Where was that taken?

[Bounty]

there might be some profit in looking up some of those photographers and seeing if they appeal to you

One photographer I like and who may have been influencing me - I've been seeing his photographs daily for years - is the in-house photographer of my paper:

http://www.standaard.be/Artikel/Detail. ... 090920_003

He has an exhibit I'm planning to see soon.

[The Grim Squeaker]

At the end of the day Simplicius made a snapshot of a pier. That's all the shot objectively is, and anyone who says he was making a deep exposé of the changing face of leisure in the north-eastern US is full of hot air. But that doesn't mean you can't personally see it as something more, even if that "something more" is just there by accident.

What, like this shot from Iceland?
Iceland-39



Also, two more shots from Iceland:
IMG_0433

Double Rainbow:

[Simplicius]

Art discussion moved to Photo Talk. We now return you to our regularly scheduled feature.



Blown Highlights (Greek Revival)

IMG_0433

I rather like this one. The scene is good-looking enough, and the stream gives it depth, which I think landscapes need.

Double Rainbow

This one not so much. The rainbow is pretty, but the rest of the scene is bland.

[The Grim Squeaker]

Art discussion moved to Photo Talk. We now return you to our regularly scheduled feature.

He's gone mad with power! I demand he be sent before the senate for abuse of his powers! The very idea of a mod taking care of a slightly derailed topic without HOSing it, bah!

Blown Highlights (Greek Revival)

Have you ever seen/read Sin City? I like this, as long as it's not overdone it's a nice bit of over the top contrast/BW.
What was the light like in the base photo?

IMG_0433

I rather like this one. The scene is good-looking enough, and the stream gives it depth, which I think landscapes need.

Very 3d . Thanks.

Double Rainbow

This one not so much. The rainbow is pretty, but the rest of the scene is bland.

So many rainbows, so few that had interest beyond being a double rainbow, over a mountain or across a valley. (The second rainbow is very hard to see her due to the compression, alass).

[Simplicius]

I like this, as long as it's not overdone it's a nice bit of over the top contrast/BW.
What was the light like in the base photo?

Pretty ordinary. Mid afternoon oblique, very clear and bright because of autumnal high pressure.

Never read Sin City, though I've seen examples of 'the look' around. This actually reminded me of the "Scarface" poster after I looked at it for a bit, though.

[The Grim Squeaker]

(It's the next day in my time zone!)

Two more from Iceland:
You were saying something about a landscape shot with depth?
Iceland-76

Deep blue waters. Unedited

Iceland-6

The most glorious morning. We had about 40 minutes of sunshine in the morning after a day of torrential rain, heavy fog and light drizzle set in a few minutes after I took this and most of the other sunny shots in the Iceland set. (It was around the mountain hut of my first night out in the mountains).
The steam is from natural geothermal sources causing water to boil and steam.

And one more shot from London zoo, the many colours of the lake (the colours were from houses and river boats. It's been years since I went in one of those):
Water painting canal

Merry go round

[The Grim Squeaker]

I like this, as long as it's not overdone it's a nice bit of over the top contrast/BW.
What was the light like in the base photo?

Pretty ordinary. Mid afternoon oblique, very clear and bright because of autumnal high pressure.

Just curious as to whether you worked with strong natural overhead light or angled or low light.

Never read Sin City, though I've seen examples of 'the look' around. This actually reminded me of the "Scarface" poster after I looked at it for a bit, though.

It's extremely high contrast Black and white (with very little grey), it'd be weird if you hadn't seen it (or sepia) .

[J]

Blown Highlights (Greek Revival)

Hmmm...I don't think the heavily posterized B&W effect works here. I'm not sure why it doesn't, but I think part of it is how parts of the structure are chopped off and left hanging in space with frame of reference. It's an unsettling effect for me as I can't piece the picture back together without some effort, and even then there's so much missing that it hurts my brain. I expect some degree of realism in a photo and this stretches it way too far for me.

Personally I'd edit the original photo (assuming it's possible) so it's closer to this one. Darken the background while keeping a full range of tones in the subject, and maybe pushing a few of the highlights to pure white.

[The Grim Squeaker]

Personally I'd editing the original photo (assuming it's possible) so it's closer to this one. Darken the background while keeping a full range of tones in the subject, and maybe pushing a few of the highlights to pure white.

That's just a "normal" high contrast BW photo. Albeit, a really really nice one, who took it?

[J]

That's just a "normal" high contrast BW photo. Albeit, a really really nice one, who took it?

Actually it's a simulation of a B&W photo taken with a Wratten #29 filter, done by taking a colour photo and mixing it down to B&W using the channel mixer tool in Photoshop. See Monolith by Ansel Adams for a similar filter effect, with filters or the channel mixer tool it's possible to retain the full range of greys in a photo while putting blue skies to near black, with standard contrast & brightness adjustments and even the more powerful ones such as the curves tool, it isn't possible.

Oh, and that's my picture.

[The Grim Squeaker]

That's just a "normal" high contrast BW photo. Albeit, a really really nice one, who took it?

Actually it's a simulation of a B&W photo taken with a Wratten #29 filter, done by taking a colour photo and mixing it down to B&W using the channel mixer tool in Photoshop. See Monolith by Ansel Adams for a similar filter effect, with filters or the channel mixer tool it's possible to retain the full range of greys in a photo while putting blue skies to near black, with standard contrast & brightness adjustments and even the more powerful ones such as the curves tool, it isn't possible.

Oh, and that's my picture.

I know it's very possible even if I can't do BW worth a pig's trotter myself, there's no need to drag Adams into this .

Excellent shot.

[Simplicius]

Hmmm...I don't think the heavily posterized B&W effect works here. I'm not sure why it doesn't, but I think part of it is how parts of the structure are chopped off and left hanging in space with frame of reference. It's an unsettling effect for me as I can't piece the picture back together without some effort, and even then there's so much missing that it hurts my brain. I expect some degree of realism in a photo and this stretches it way too far for me.

Personally I'd edit the original photo (assuming it's possible) so it's closer to this one. Darken the background while keeping a full range of tones in the subject, and maybe pushing a few of the highlights to pure white.

Yeah, I don't know about this edit. I don't really like how the parts of the building in the foreground are cut off, but the structure being what it is, there's no good clean place to crop it and keep the cupola as prominent. Also, there is a rather limited tonal range in the original photo anyway, with basically nothing below a quarter tone. Lastly, detail at the top of the cupola is lost in glare, so the more glare I cut out, the better the detail is shown.

The first edit, that you didn't like, isn't much of an edit at all: I just dragged middle gray all the way to 255 and left it there..

[aerius]

One idea I have is selectively darkening everything except the cupola, but that's hard to do without making it look fake. I could darken the lower left part more but that makes the selecting & masking a fair bit harder. The other thing I can think of is to add some vignetting effects with Photoshop, I did a bit of this but I'm pretty sure it can pushed quite a bit further.

[The Grim Squeaker]

South-129

5D with 16-35 Lens. I swapped memory cards around, I couldn't get a decent shot with my crop camera, the scene was too wide and I wanted to include the staircase.
I still prefer the cost/size/weight of crop gear of course, but it was fun to see what a real wide angle lens is like .

Very Ken Rockwell.
South-22


South-2

[J]

[The Grim Squeaker]

Not bad although the right side is "uneven" in temrs of the composition, it's too cut off (at the base). If you couldn't get any farther back (remember, rails are for pulling, not pushing ) then maybe moving the camera an iota to the right and up?

I see where you were going here (ultra wide shot \/) but it's not tight enough in terms of the shapes. Maybe i'm just nitpicking. Great shot! (where did you take it?)

[J]

(where did you take it?)

I took it a few dozen paces from where I took this photo.

[RRoan]

[J]

I seem to have stumbled into a Klan meeting...well...minus the pointy hats...

[aerius]

I gotta wonder how many complaints this company gets from feminazis.