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Wednesday Landscapes, 14 July 2021


Leslie Reid

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You are invited to upload one or more of your landscape photos and, if you’d like, to accompany your image with some commentary: challenges you faced in making the image? your intent for the image? settings? post-processing decisions? why you did what you did? the place and time? or an aspect you’d like feedback on? And please feel free to ask questions of others who have posted images or to join the discussion. If you don’t feel like using words, that’s OK too—unaccompanied images (or unaccompanied words, for that matter) are also very much welcomed. As for the technicalities, the usual forum guidelines apply: files < 1 MB; image size <1000 px maximum dimension.

 

I couldn't decide between these two views of the same swash lines. Does anyone have any preferences here? (And yes, "neither" is also a valid option)

 

the more abstract version:

R02-IMG_5211-Edit-Edit-2.jpg.43d9d4d2696c1351b0e41faa77b7ecf8.jpg

 

and the more landscape version:

R02-IMG_5187-Edit-Edit-Edit.jpg.1ec419728f90a6f1f1df09d157455281.jpg

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You are invited to upload one or more of your landscape photos and, if you’d like, to accompany your image with some commentary: challenges you faced in making the image? your intent for the image? settings? post-processing decisions? why you did what you did? the place and time? or an aspect you’d like feedback on? And please feel free to ask questions of others who have posted images or to join the discussion. If you don’t feel like using words, that’s OK too—unaccompanied images (or unaccompanied words, for that matter) are also very much welcomed. As for the technicalities, the usual forum guidelines apply: files < 1 MB; image size <1000 px maximum dimension.

 

I couldn't decide between these two views of the same swash lines. Does anyone have any preferences here? (And yes, "neither" is also a valid option)

 

the more abstract version:

[ATTACH=full]1395038[/ATTACH]

 

and the more landscape version:

[ATTACH=full]1395039[/ATTACH]

 

By a slim margin, I prefer the 2nd, since it involves the shoreline.

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OK, Leslie. It's your turn. Which one do you prefer and why?

Thanks for the question, Michael—It made me look at the photos from a different point of view (the “why”), and that clarified a lot in my mind. So, a long-winded answer…

 

Why I like the abstract version:

  1. The strangeness—it’s not immediately evident what it is
  2. It’s not something I’ve seen before
  3. The simplicity—it would read OK in high contrast B&W, which is a genre I have a particular fondness for
  4. Those gracefully and strangely sinuous lines, and the way they lead my eye in endless loops throughout the image.

Why I like the landscape version:

  1. I like the contrast between the high-contrast horizontal lines of the exposed cliffs, the soft gray of the diagonal talus cones, and the high contrast curves of the swash lines.
  2. I do like those cliffs…
  3. …and those swash lines
  4. But I don’t think it hangs together compositionally as well as the abstract version, and the large foreground area reduces the importance of the cliffs and talus cones.

All of this got me thinking critically about my original post-processing: I would have done better to process in a way that emphasized the particular aspects that I now realize had attracted me to the images. So I converted the first to B&W and played with the contrast/tone curve/texture in Lightroom. For the second, I cropped to make the cliffs more prominent and slightly desaturated the foreground to make the talus cones a bit more prominent in comparison. I like both revised versions better than the originals.

 

The revised abstract version:

R02-IMG_5211-Edit-Edit-4.jpg.101b2408ada845c579060c992c0676ed.jpg

 

The revised landscape version:

R02-IMG_5187-Edit-Edit-Edit-4.jpg.cb9cd7ef4f97588005ae5b3aba1e4927.jpg

 

...you may have noticed that I appear to have accidentally overlooked answering the question about which I prefer...

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Thanks for the question, Michael—It made me look at the photos from a different point of view (the “why”), and that clarified a lot in my mind. So, a long-winded answer…

 

Why I like the abstract version:

  1. The strangeness—it’s not immediately evident what it is
  2. It’s not something I’ve seen before
  3. The simplicity—it would read OK in high contrast B&W, which is a genre I have a particular fondness for
  4. Those gracefully and strangely sinuous lines, and the way they lead my eye in endless loops throughout the image.

Why I like the landscape version:

  1. I like the contrast between the high-contrast horizontal lines of the exposed cliffs, the soft gray of the diagonal talus cones, and the high contrast curves of the swash lines.
  2. I do like those cliffs…
  3. …and those swash lines
  4. But I don’t think it hangs together compositionally as well as the abstract version, and the large foreground area reduces the importance of the cliffs and talus cones.

All of this got me thinking critically about my original post-processing: I would have done better to process in a way that emphasized the particular aspects that I now realize had attracted me to the images. So I converted the first to B&W and played with the contrast/tone curve/texture in Lightroom. For the second, I cropped to make the cliffs more prominent and slightly desaturated the foreground to make the talus cones a bit more prominent in comparison. I like both revised versions better than the originals.

 

The revised abstract version:

[ATTACH=full]1395323[/ATTACH]

 

The revised landscape version:

[ATTACH=full]1395324[/ATTACH]

 

...you may have noticed that I appear to have accidentally overlooked answering the question about which I prefer...

 

Leslie, although your post work certainly is more sophisticated than mine, I understand why you like each version or, at least, I think so. Congratulations on giving birth to two more children. P:S. I came across an image that you may want to examine in light of yours.

 

18847444_montaukpoint.thumb.jpg.a4083110b529225910740584bff768a6.jpg

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You are invited to upload one or more of your landscape photos and, if you’d like, to accompany your image with some commentary: challenges you faced in making the image? your intent for the image? settings? post-processing decisions? why you did what you did? the place and time? or an aspect you’d like feedback on? And please feel free to ask questions of others who have posted images or to join the discussion. If you don’t feel like using words, that’s OK too—unaccompanied images (or unaccompanied words, for that matter) are also very much welcomed. As for the technicalities, the usual forum guidelines apply: files < 1 MB; image size <1000 px maximum dimension.

 

I couldn't decide between these two views of the same swash lines. Does anyone have any preferences here? (And yes, "neither" is also a valid option)

 

the more abstract version:

[ATTACH=full]1395038[/ATTACH]

 

and the more landscape version:

[ATTACH=full]1395039[/ATTACH]

You are invited to upload one or more of your landscape photos and, if you’d like, to accompany your image with some commentary: challenges you faced in making the image? your intent for the image? settings? post-processing decisions? why you did what you did? the place and time? or an aspect you’d like feedback on? And please feel free to ask questions of others who have posted images or to join the discussion. If you don’t feel like using words, that’s OK too—unaccompanied images (or unaccompanied words, for that matter) are also very much welcomed. As for the technicalities, the usual forum guidelines apply: files < 1 MB; image size <1000 px maximum dimension.

 

I couldn't decide between these two views of the same swash lines. Does anyone have any preferences here? (And yes, "neither" is also a valid option)

 

the more abstract version:

[ATTACH=full]1395038[/ATTACH]

 

and the more landscape version:

[ATTACH=full]1395039[/ATTACH]

 

I prefer the first photo Leslie. That said I also read your insightful response to Michael Linder where you broke down your feelings about the two shots. I like the first shot even more in your second edit. I think that the second shot in a sense has two subjects – first the beach and swash lines and secondarily the cliffs. I think these two subjects compete without complimenting each other; my eye is drawn to one subject and then the other.

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I prefer the first photo Leslie. That said I also read your insightful response to Michael Linder where you broke down your feelings about the two shots. I like the first shot even more in your second edit. I think that the second shot in a sense has two subjects – first the beach and swash lines and secondarily the cliffs. I think these two subjects compete without complimenting each other; my eye is drawn to one subject and then the other.

Thanks for the detailed explanation--that's particularly helpful.

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