Awakening

fantastic shot

these lights are incredible!

This image has been selected for discussion. It is not necessarily the "best" picture the Elves have seen this week, nor is it a contest. It is simply an image that the Elves found interesting and worthy of discussion. Discussion of photo.net policy, including the choice of Photograph of the Week should not take place here, but in the Site Feedback forum.

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Thank you and enjoy!

I find this photo a truly jewel to admire. Compositon, color range, light and whatever

Tomas did to achieve this resulting image, have been so well chosen for my taste.

Best regards.

This an exceptional moment that here has been captured. The light coming down from the sky (not that early ?) in streams and the light on the branches of the trees are beautiful and very well made. I find however that the very strong shadows of especially the trees to the left break the general soft ligth of the scene. Congratulations to Tomas with the POW.

A most striking photograph. Totally unusual lighting, and not just here, but in the other few pictures in your portfolio. You were indeed lucky to come upon a find such as this.

 

The mist is heavier farther away and lower to the ground as expected, but what it did to the sun's light is remarkable.

 

The immediate foreground gives me the impression that it is sliding downward to the right, and as has been mentioned above, the shadow of the nearby tree on the left may be too harsh. The upper left corner could be improved with a tad of contrast if available, or cloning in some vague tree images. Oh, and try as I might, I cannot find a way to improve it by cropping--even to these old eyes.

 

I really like the photograph and wish I would ever spot such a scene to work with. Nice job overall. Congratulations for being chosen.

 

Willie the Cropper

Very nice image, great sense of time and place. But being a perfectionist, I'd crop the top 10% for two reasons.

 

1. It would keep the eye in more, but more importantly,

 

2. It would get that bright area (creating a diagonal line) seperating the image in half a bit higher, into the upper 1/3 where we all know the balance works best.

 

Best regards on a very nice capture Tomas and a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all. MS

Totally unusual lighting, indeed. A light I never met within the gone decades of my life and I may never meet in the following - on my walks in nature, unmanipulated as well as your photographs ...

Yep, Michael, you are correct -- I didn't even see that top 10 percent crop, and I should have. It does wonders for the photograph.

 

Willie the Cropper

Tomas, I looked through your portfolio and your website and the lightharmony site. You have a master touch that combines a high aesthetic with a high technique.

 

As a result, you produce a uniquely bearable beauty while at the same time plying light, color, texture, object, angle and composition to create a belief system I can use to move within your frame.

 

However in this picture, though it may be unmanipulated, there is no visual cue that tells me I am not seeing something engineered after the fact. Specifically, the shadow lines look too perfect, too unattenuated from their travel downward to the baseline.

 

The point is not: "is this fake?" I'm assuming it is totally genuine as you haven't said otherwise. My point is that it looks unreal and thereby I tend to reflexively include it in the category of manufactured images. I do not enter the frame in the same way I do with almost every other image you have online.

 

Being an outdoors person, I know the unrepeatable magic show light can sometimes produce. The trick is to somehow show that it is happening in the same world we live in.

It is a stunning image if it indeed is a "reasonably" unmanipulated photograph. And I say "reasonably" because to some degree all images produced are "manipulated" (even film images), however in the digital age the temptation to alter, beyond simple enhancement is very great.

 

If this is an unaltered image it is a fantastic photograph.

Wow Tomas! It's a beautiful picture. Great lighting and good composition. I would call this 'The Forbidden Tree'the one in the foreground. All the light rays are converging to this tree. First I thought the sky on the top right was distracting, but that little sky is giving the dimension to the fourth row of trees.

The kind of photograph that makes you miss the tree for the forest I guess:)

Well, when you have the tenacity to go out there & wait for the right conditions you get rewarded. Love the tree layers & the light is great. It's very refreshing to see such a good shot which is not manipulated. Congrats on POW. Very deserving

I can fully subscribe to all previous comments : yes, this is a shot that is most appealing, and constitutes a real homage to the beauty of nature.

My only minor nitpick would be the dark shadow of the tree on the left, which keeps drawing my eye, without finding any balance on the right side.

 

erwin

i would like to read how this picture was made. but the photo is great.

it's lovely but...as I visually scroll down the image on my screen from top to bottom, I wish

there was a payoff at the bottom, something that all that lovely light lines led to. Maybe a

herd of moose or a nude or a barn or..gosh..something

I was nearby when Tomas shot this photo. And I can tell that seeing this once-in-a-lifetime light from a wrong spot made me really mad. Those who think this is a manipulation can check here or here to see how few others captured this unrepeatable moment. I don't want to advertise anything here just hope to prove it was all real and that Tomas made a really excellent job with the scene (unlike us). Love the way he approached it with rays falling on the tree and ground just like rain of light.

I would have to disagree with the 10% top crop suggestion. I think the shift from cooler (bluish) light at the top to very warm at the bottom is part of what makes this special. As for the other comment about lacking a payoff at the bottom of the light rays... what is there certainly seems like a pot of gold to this photographer's eye.

Thank you, Marek. Now I have 3 colours to choose. I think I take the blue one. Are you able to present a selection of this area too?

Kudos to you Tomas for capturing such an unique moment. As Marek said it seams you choose the right position and timing to take this photograph. well done, congratulations and thanks for sharing. 7/7

Why is it such a big deal if this had been a manipulated image? I personally couldn't care less - the end result is what matters and this end result here is truly excellent. I strongly disagree with the suggestion that it should be cropped at the top. This image is, of course about the beautiful light, but it is also about the recession of lighting in the upper area, something which would be totally lost if it were cropped.

The deep shadow area at bottom right bothers me slightly and I wonder if some detail could not be recovered here.

Congratulations on a superb image and a worthy photo of the week.

I agree essentially with what the previous contributer said

although my initial reaction was that there was too much space at the top if you were to crop it you would lose that sense of recession. I would disagree with the shadow though i think it needs that to give a sense of contrast and to appreciate the lighting, without that it might be in danger of looking flat7/7

I personally would like to know if the image is a photograph or if it is photoshop. That is why it is called "Photograph" of the Week on Photo.net Othewise let's open it up to all forms of graphic design.

A very wonderful and dramatic scene. However I think the composition is a bit awkward. As long as no other distracting or non-contributing elements were introduced, I would prefer a horizontal (landscape) alignment for this photo. This would eliminate most/all of the distracting blob of a shadow and further emphasize the lines of the trees being washed in rays of sunlight, which are the unique and attractive parts of this photo. I think that the foreground tree is a letdown, and breaks up both of the patterns.

Hi Tomas,

Awesome! It would have had me speechless if I were there. Thank you for this beautiful image.