black & white five eggs

Please comment, then come back and see what others have

said. I promise a lengthy post after you all have had a crack at it.

I like this a lot. My eye is instantly drawn to the black above the eggs; i think it's a great example of effective use of negative space. I'm curious about how the eggs would look if lit from both sides, and I'm also suspicious of a slight downward slant across the tops of the eggs from left to right..

I think it looks better with a little more "sky" to it. Have it so the eggs take up the bottom 3rd.

 

I like it better with the 5 eggs, even though it would be neat to have all the shadows the same.

 

I like it Carl. The chiaroscuro lighting is wonderfully executed. I like the strong contrast between the foreground and background. The shadow pattern is great. It's a nice lighting change from closeup work that's lit with one overhead Chimera to give a soft, diffused, pretty look. Your choice of using B&W film further enhances the look.

 

How did you light this? From what it appears, I guess you either used one light and filled it with bounce -- or two lights and your fill fixture was about two stops lower than your key. I'd be curious to see what it would have looked like with a kicker positioned at the same height as your lens (or a few inches lower) several degrees offset to give the egg holders a little shine. It appears that they're metallic, and the only indication of this is the last egg holder on the right side. I would love to see a similar "shine", perhaps a stop or two less bright, on all of the holders.

 

My compositional comment is that the photo appears to be slightly crooked. There appears to be a small amount more of space below the last left egg than last right egg. This causes the eggs to look as if they sloped downward from left to right. If you look at the smaller thumbnail, its more apparent.

 

I think a closeup of just one egg, lit the same way, might be somewhat more effective. Youve lost a little detail (not sure if from scan or not) in your highlights. Id love to see the tiny shadows on the bumpy surface of a lone egg.

 

Nice shot. Looking forward to reading the other critiques.

 

Please comment, then come back and see what others have said. I promise a lengthy post after you all have had a crack at it.

Hahahahahahha.... nice one, Carl.

 

two points for David.

 

I just uploaded an improvement over an older uncorrected scan that was out of square due primarily to a less than perfect slide holder in my scanner. I've also made a jpeg of a single egg, but I'll wait til later to upload it.

 

Compositionally, I like the set up. The black negative space seems to me to be an important element in the composition. The transition from light to shadow on the eggs seems a bit too abrupt for my taste. The thing that really bothers me is the faint ghosting on the black background. I thought it was my monitor at first, so I cleaned it, and it's still there. I have been studying it trying to figure out what it is back there. I see it above each egg, and in the top right corner. Maybe it's steam??? I'm not sure, but it is quite a distraction in an otherwise very clean image.

I'm reading some of the photography texts recommended by this site at the moment and this looks so much like the sort of photo they use to illustrate the effect of light and shadow. I'm finding those books heavy going so perhaps I'm jaded at the moment but this looks like a great technique shot to me but not a great shot. It feels like something designed to illustrate a point rather than say something in its own right. It does display a mastery of lighting though, and some imagination - I'd never dream of taking a shot like this, well not until now maybe.

 

OK I wrote this without cheating so now to see what bigger brains than mine have had to say.

The ghosting effect is a mystery to me. It's not steam, I can't see it on the slide, and It's not on my 11 X 16 print ( although I may have taken care of it in levels.) Possibly it's a byproduct of the scanning process; I remember wondering about it when I magnified it to clean it up.

At least on my screen, if this had more snap to it, I'd really like it. Exposure was done well.

I'm afraid this one does nothing for me ... "zip, slant, doodly-squat, nada," as a friend of mine used to say. While the lighting on the eggs is somewhat interesting, the lighting on the cups isn't and to my eyes, the composition is dull and lacking in interest. Sorry, Carl...

 

Just a short note. What was your goal ? If you ask me, I see here an attempt at a graphical and minimalistic image. Am I right ?

If so, it would be graphically stronger and more minimalistic to get rid of the floor and the "egg-holders" all together. Try a panoramic crop keeping just the top half of all the eggs and pure black background, then darken the image a lot, till the shadows are very dark grey - and add contrast after that. The result should be 10 times better than what I see here. If what I wrote here is unclear, feel free to e-mail a low-res version of this to me, and I'll try to show you what I mean if you like.

Minimalistic design-based photography has to go all the way to be the purest possible, or it will only be half of its essence. Regards.

Marc, I think your idea of boosting the contrast is consistent with what I'm trying to do with this image, although I've decided to leave the composition as is. Thanks for your good ideas.

Hi Carl, maybe I'm used to seeing modern advertising photos containing perfect specimens, so the less than flawless image I see here looks rough. The 2nd egg is slightly tilted and the bit of shadow behind it distracting. The holders are presumably stainless steel; it'd be nicer to my eye if the remaining 4 had a similar glow as the far right piece, and maybe switch the cloth base to a high gloss surface. Gee, I'm starting to talk as though I know how to do better. :-)

Thank you all for your comments. I can't really say if this image qualifies as minimalist art, but I think it serves as a teaching tool . . . yes, a textbook image. At least it did for me.

 

A rhythm shot contains a series of identical or similar elements uniformly spaced. Sometimes an obvious variation in one element makes it more appealing. Sometimes it's not necessary. If there is no obvious single focal point, the eye will start to look for one thus making it a good shot to learn about close inspection before taking the picture.

 

The series was out of level by less than one degree yet was noticed right away. The second egg from the left was indeed tilted right and back which meant it was the only one without the reflected light from the rim of the cup. The middle egg was shorter than the rest. I kept the right egg in the frame because it was the only one fully lit by the morning sun - the only source of light in the picture - and I wanted the shadows and reflections to be the main point of interest. The unlit backside of each egg would be expected, as was the texture from side lighting. The shadow each egg casts on the one behind it was also expected, but the pleasant surprise was the light reflected back onto the top left portion of the shadow of all but the last egg. Doesn't necessarily make the shot for everyone, but I liked it.

 

 

Hi Carl. Nice work and well set up.

 

I'm sure the other visitors will comment but i would have liked to see a sixth egg in position but not in the frame to take the lighting off the last cup. I don't know if that will be everybodies consensus though.

 

 

Mike Sea

I shouldn't have read all the comments before posting my own critique, I'm now more confused than ever! I like the simplicity of the shot, even if it's a bit more academic. I agree with Marc that you could use a featureless background, but I'm not sure that pure black would work that well.

 

I wish the egges were more regular, with a shadow on the last egg and some light bounced on the first in the shadow area. The large negative space is crucial to the sucess of this shot. The suggested crop with four eggs is intresting, but really need five eggs, so that there's a middle egg. Sorry about this late comment, I was on holidays for the last few days.

Humpty Dumpty Soldiers... hehe... this is a really fun study of fives. I like that one of them get's the light. He's the "leader" and the rest follow after him. what a fun composition. I would have liked to see a little less exposure, and maybe a little more fill light, so that you can have details in the highlights (less exposure) and since you'd lose most of your shadows, adding the fill from the front/left, would bring those back. Nice work

Wow! Carl. It can all get so deep! I just think it's a great photo.

 

 

Chris...

Hey where's Ken someone go get that guy, everybody should have at least five eggs a week.

Carl....I like the rythem of this image....composition is great and the contrast seems right to me...at least on my monitor....any more and you would lose detail in the eggs> Congrats on an excellent image.

This made me laugh. Nothing more, nothing else, ith's just funny IMO.