rust and paint five ivy leaves

I desaturated an orange area on the wood middle right where a

paint chip had recently fallen off. Otherwise a straight shot. Any

reactions?

Effective composition. The muted colors and soft light work well with the subject with just enough shadow to give a three dimensional look. Worthy of a nice print.

 

 

The contrast looks a little low for Elite Chrome 100. Was this the scan? Did you try it with slightly higher contrast (to deepen the blacks)? Having asked, I suspect it looks better with the lower contrast, given the subject (as stated above). Good shot.

While Carl's title makes it clear the ivy leaves were his intended subject, this isn't so clear from the image itself. To my eye, the peeling paint makes an equally strong subject (mind you, I may be biased in this regard as I shoot a lot of "peeling paint"-type images myself) and in fact, it may even be the stronger of the two.

 

As such -- and assuming the original scene allowed it, of course -- I would have composed the image a bit differently, with less emphasis on the leaves and more on the paint and exposed wood. I particularly like the exposed wood on the right side of the frame and probably would have tried to include more of this, if possible.

 

I do like the almost pastel colors although I find myself wishing for more sharpness (I can't tell if the softness is intentional or simply an artifact of the scanning process) and perhaps just a bit more contrast. I might also have dodged the shadow cast by the second leaf up from the bottom as it creates a dark area in the middle of the image that traps my eye and possibly burned the light paint at the top of the frame as it tends to divert my attention, too.

 

All in, I can certainly understand why you chose to photograph this scene but this image, as it stands, misses the mark a bit for my particular set of tastes and preferences. (For what it's worth, I find the same to be true with a lot of my images as well and there are many subjects that I've had to shoot three or four or even five times in an effort to capture on film that which I find attractive to the eye.)

Effective composition.

 

Yes, I think so too. It's really a neat photo. I would have liked brighter/richer color though, at least on the leaves.

 

The minor dodging and burning is a good iea, I'll work on it.

 

I took perhaps a dozen of these and kept three or four. The hard part was getting clean edges and corners. The title is perhaps a bit misleading. I meant it to be about the interplay between the two, actually, more about the three vertical lines. I have lots of shots from this site with just paint. which I'll upload at some point.

 

I just did an interesting experiment which you might want to try. Display one of your original jpegs on your monitor and compare it to the one that was uploaded. They're not the same. The original is more saturated.

 

Prior to uploading I went beyond the usual levels adjustments and used curves to boost contrast and color just short of what I thought was garrish. Yet I still expected the muted tones would be less than impressive to many viewers. It's an issue I have not been able to resolve, but it's the main reason I posted this image for critique.

 

 

Hi Carl, I think the lack of contrast between the two vertical surfaces and the grain pattern on the left pane makes the overall image look flat. The entire background appears as a painted flat board, but the crease says it's a 90 degree angle that strains the eye. The leaves will possibly be more comfortable on the lighter side if there was more contrast to the two panes, but the shadow side would then dominate from the strong peeling outline.

 

The colors are of course out of ones hands from a purist's approach, but to my eye, the abrupt transition of atonal hues detract.

The difference in color saturation that you've noted is probably a color-space mismatch although the fact that photo.net usually further compresses the images you submit doesn't help, either. Before uploading your next image, convert it to sRGB first and see if this doesn't improve the color match between what you see in your browser and in your image editor. (Mind you, with some images, doing this will screw up the color royally but at least you'll know this before you upload it and perhaps you can even tweak the file to compensate for it somewhat.)

I find this to be an appealing image compositionally. I think it possibly could be better with more interesting light, but I actually like it with this rather flat light. The beautiful curves of the vine contrast well with all of the linearness and angularity of the other elements in this shot. I also like the subdued colors, they work well with this particular image.

Sorry, but this one doesn't work for me. This vine section is not specially attractive and the peeled paint competes quite effectively for attention. The light is extremely flat and the color balance, a bit too much on the blue side. Compositionnally, you have two parallel subjects almost dead in the center.

 

I can see the attractiveness of this spot, but I think that waiting for the right light will help a lot. Shooting with the camera parallel the the leaves with extremely short DOF would put a clear emphasis on the vine at the expense of the paint.

I rather like this one which surprises me because I usually prefer brighter colours and a more documentary rather than artistic approach.

 

My eye falls on the paint chips but gets drawn to the leaves by the vein detail and then to the stem by the fingering on the stalks. I think the muted slightly washed out look of the wood makes a great 'background' to the shot.

 

The curve of the organic vine juxtaposes nicely with the vertical straight line and the cracks in the paint.

 

Again not a shot I would have thought to take and I'm surprised the rating for originality is so low.

 

Nice work.

Carl, I think this works really well because the paint chips have very little chrominance. Consequently, since our eye has 3 times as many rods than cones, the difference in time from the luminance information v.s the chrominace information reaching the brian causes somewhat of a visual trick. Makes you take a second look, and that's a key part of a good photo.

 

The composition works well. The color, however, of the leaves is almost fake looking. Not sure if this is good or not.

 

Well seen.

i love this one,more so than the paino or burnt car series! The shape of the Ivy leaves sits nicely with that of the peeling paint. I dont think the two fight for attention because the leaves are dark whereas the paint is light in tone.

A nice shot.