Herons in Whitewater, Great Falls VA

I appreciate all the comments and encouragement. It's a little intimidating being the POW. I actually saw my picture here on the site before I got the e-mail notifying me of its selection -- I thought it was some kind of an error with my Internet Explorer cache ;-). I was both surprised and anxious, knowing I'd get some tough comments. I did get some, and I understand them and agree with many of the points.

 

As an aside, this shot was originally posted as a response to a question in a thread about the benefits of IS technology, and not initially intended for critique. That's why the first several comments concentrate on the IS lens.

 

My own critique: I'm learning and just doing the best I can ;-). I think the heron on the left is tremendous, but the one on the right has the unfortunate merge with the rocks. Plus, the water behind its head looks a little funny, since it is similar in tone. Regardless, I like the shot. I think the poses make it look as if they are interacting, playing together in the water (actually, one was arriving and the other leaving). And personally, I like the hint of color more than B&W or more vivid color -- I think the subdued grays, dark blues and blacks contribute to the "Japanese painting" feel that Anton mentioned.

 

There certainly are many better bird and wildlife shots, lots of them on this forum. You don't have to look far to find them. I agree with the criticisms pointing that out ;-).

 

Ian: the location is on the Virginia side of the park -- go to the right just past the overlook near the visitor center, where you can climb down the rocks to get as close to the water as possible. There is a comfy rock at the bottom. This is looking back upstream to the main part of the falls.

 

Tony: I am fairly certain this was f/8 at 1/125". If it helps, I rate RDPIII at EI80. And this really was handheld (as are the others in the folder that say that!), albeit in a well-supported sitting position -- on a rock on the other side of the Potomac from these birds. I had my tripod set up next to me, but I didn't have a ball head back then, and I was handholding a lot of the action shots. I use the tripod with this lens *much* more since I purchased a ball head.

 

Gloria: Thanks. Now I know how you must have felt ;-). Being POW feels a lot more "exposed" than posting to the happy little community at photocritique!

 

Peter: The "edit your comment" is always an option for any comment you leave. HAL will display that as long as you're logged in ;-).

 

Thanks again for the comments, encouragement, and helpful suggestions.

 

Thank you Micheal Spinak, I was looking at the comments and was wondering the same thing. How can people say that picture is the best out there or beautiful, excellent or perfect. What happen to critiquing someones picture for POW. For what it needs improving on, different approaches it the photographer could have taken. The POW has gotten better within the last month granted. But for those boosting egos and not saying anything constructive to help the photographer, please try it next time.

Brian, I've always loved this image! Congrats on Photo of the day!

 

Greg Downing

www.gdphotography.com

Very nice job. At first I wasn't so taken with it as I like some of your other photographs better (Hawaii and Eiffel Tower), but after looking more closely I agree that it has a beautiful painting-like quality and brilliance.

Good job Brian. I really enjoyed looking at this pic and the rest of your fine collection. They look great assembled together (particularly away from the gunfire over at PC :-)

Keep them coming.

Art S.

Art Sands Photography

As a ex-pro wildlife/nature photographer I can understand how differcult a good shot can be.

This is a good shot. I would like to see the heron on the right with its head higher. Also the right herons right wing blends into the dark rock to much for me, may be moving to the right could have helped. I hope the original has better detail. When ever possible always take several shots and at different angles. When I see a great shot I could burn 2-3 rolls, then I edit the hell out of them and come out with 1-4 keepers. Over all this is still a very good photo.

 

Milton

I notice a trend. Ever since the elves have started posting the reason why POW was chosen, very few people seem to disagree with them. The very first comment by the selectors of POW seems to be influencing the majority of the comments.

 

Frankly, its getting a little boring going through the heap of adulation for a not-so-incredible photograph. don't get me wrong....i think its a nice photograph. but as the photographer admits, there are a number of flaws in this snap. a positive criticism on those flaws would benefit all of us. that is what i expect to see here.... unfortunately, since the last few weeks, that element has been missing.

I know NOTHING about photograpy and just happened to link to this site while reading a presentation by Philip Greenspun. The beautiful photograph drew me in. I learned a bit about photograpy today from this photograph and the comments. Especially helpful were the more critical ones, and the photographers response. Also knowledge of the context of the settings gave me a whole new insight into the photo. The whole experience makes me want to go out and take some photos. Thanks for the insight and inspiration.

I cannot think of a bad thing to say about this photograph, other than it took me a few seconds to find the head of the second heron.

I disagree with the comment saying the photo would be better without the second heron. Put your finger over it and see what you lose. There's a subtle underlying dialogue going on between the two birds - one higher than the other, the second almost bowing in respect. I suppose you could go on reading it for hours. Great work!

I agree with Milton and the others that this is a great picture. The subject, color, and dynamic tension within the composition, and sense of moment, are tremendous, not to mention the similarities to Japanese painting. It takes a very practised eye to come up with a shot like this.

 

I disagree with the technical criticisms, especially the one about the second heron not being placed correctly in the composition. You have to attempt nature and/or decisive moment photography to appreciate how difficult it is to get that fleeting moment of perfection when moving subjects are pleasingly aligned.

 

But much more importantly, to appreciate how the perfect composition that you have in your head never actually happens. If the second heron had moved its wing so that it was outlined by white water, this photographer would have caught it, I'm sure.

 

Visual reality approximates visual perfection but often never achieves it.

 

Good photographers know not to strain after the unattainable moment and work with what is available...

 

Excellent clairity of picture. I see your vision there. Great capture and use of the long lense to press the water right up against the heron's back like it was a silk curtain.

I really like the dynamic movements captured within this photo. All the movement conveys the feeling of action and make the viewer feel like they are present at the scene. Excellent !!

Magnificent shot, congratulations!

 

Since this site is also a learning site, you might want to point out to beginners that shooting with a 560mm lens at 1/125 is usually a recipe for a blurred picture. I know there has been some discussion about this but I thought it was not explained well.

 

I'm not a Canon user but, apparently, the Canon IS lens has some stability machinery in it. From the appearance of this shot, the IS technology looks to be very effective! To get a shot this sharp with an ordinary 600mm telephoto, you would have to use a shutterspeed of 1/1000 and/or use a tripod.

 

Thanks,

John

Very busy.

I can't see any particularly "bitter comments" in the posts on this pic. Criticism, yes. Bitterness, no.

 

I can see some pertinent questions (e.g. my own, on exposure, which elicited the information that the film was in fact pushed almost a full f-stop and was not really "handheld" in the true sense of the word - being taken from a "well-supported sitting position" - vital information in the technical context within which this pic was originally uploaded).

 

I have also seen Mike Spinak's and Banks White's scepticism about the artistic quality of the photograph, in the context of expressing a general view on the quality and motivations of critique in Photonet, as exemplified by companion critiques of this photograph.

 

Apart from these, almost every other comment on this picture has been effusive, even gushing. It is obvious that there are a whole bunch of people out their who have formed a support group for this photographer and his image. That some of these reviewers are obviously acquaintances of the photographer partially explains this phenomenon.

 

But what is this photograph really about?

 

It is a picture of two birds, in mildly interesting "wings akimbo" positions, with a background of gray water and dark rocks. The image was taken from a good distance away from a safe, sturdily established position. There is not much emotional connection between the photographer and the subjects due to this distance alone. The composition is not particularly extraordinary. It is an OK photograph, well exposed and workmanlike, but "a very fine work of art"?, "amazing"?, "double 10"? it is not. Sorry.

 

Judging by his own comments, I think the photographer would readily agree with me.

 

A large part of the picture's apparent "success" is due to the very expensive robotic special purpose IS lenses and camera used to make it. If you had to bring back a picture of two herons on a rock and you couldn't get closer than 50 metres or so then you would naturally use the equipment mentioned. But this critique forum should be primarily about the artistic merit of the photograph of the week as frameworked by the photographer's (express or implied) declaration of artistic intent. In this case the declaration is express: "this shot was originally posted as a response to a question in a thread about the benefits of IS technology".

 

As a work of art, this picture, to me, is not the masterpiece that a majority of its reviewers have described.

 

This, I think, is what Mike was talking about when he used the phrase, "you're doing a disservice to the photographer and the photo.net community".

 

When Waleed Saleh said in his post on this pic, "photography is the art of appreciating everyday scenes" he was only half right. The essential element of the pictorial photographic art is not only to APPRECIATE beauty, but also to COMMUNICATE IT BEAUTIFULLY. This photograph is OF beauty, and is attractive and competent, but is not beautiful in its own right. It is a good illustrative pic of the habits of herons on rocks and a textbook example of the use of techno lenses, but not a lot more. This is all the photographer himself intended.

 

As to constructive advice to the photographer: the best I could give is to throw away that "wonder" lens and get to grips with your subject. Mix it in there with those birds. Let them crap on your head and torment you all day with their un-cooperative antics. Jump in the river with them if you have to. But get rid of that servo-assisted sniper-scope. And then come back with something we can all be genuinely proud of and appreciate for its message, not its medium. Get emotionally involved in your subject and its environment. Then you will produce works of emotion. Technical excellence (even artifically assisted) can be - and should be - an aid to this involvement and its presentation, but cannot of itself do the job only YOU and your emotional vision can do.

 

Advice to the Fan Club: this guy's good, but don't ruin his talent with ridiculous gushy praise that will swell his head and make him lazy.

I've got cynical about photographs recently (or maybe much more critical); I wish people would be a bit more reserved with their praise. As Tony said, 'wow, great photo' isn't much help to anyone. It is just a photo after all...

 

The only major fault with this photo is the lack of contrast between the beak of the heron and the surrounding water; the wingtip looks fine to me.

I don't know if its the fault or the scan (or compression artefacts), but the second heron is rather soft too.

 

I love the way the three 'layers' of rock and the foreground wave crests give this picture a real sense of physical space. I found myself looking at the optical illusion (and the rock/water textures) rather than the herons; I guess I'm not a bird lover!

 

I would have been proud to have taken this picture, but I just don't agree with the sycophants.

 

Why is it that no one can submit a critical comment without someone saying it's because the criticizers are bitter and frustrated? Gimme a break! If somehow one of my photos ever won POW I'd rather have 100 critical posts than a single of the rah-rah, cotton candy comments like I see here. Those comments make me nauseous.

 

By the way, nice photos Mike.

 

Tony, your comments express almost my exact feelings. You must be frustrated and bitter too! Oh, wait! Your photo was POW last week. And so was another just before that! AND another photo was top for the critique area for a good part of a week too! Makes no sense!

 

Brian, very, VERY nice photo. Have fun, do more, show us more!

Lovely picture of a waterfall but those two birds get in the way. I'd have framed more over to the right portrait rather than landscape, easy when you're handholding. Then, when the birds had got out of the way, I'd have made an abstact of the waterfall.

 

However. Great demo shot of the use of Canon IS techno genius. And a nice pic of one bird telling another bird the size of the fish that got away.

 

'Mildred it was thiiiiiis big.... really!'

 

Oh my how we take it all too seriously.

 

Lots of love

 

John!

Technically seems fine...sharp focus, thought may have been involved in the composition...who chooses pic of the week? I must've missed something somewhere...

I agree with you up to a point. I am not suggesting an apologist aesthetic standard for nature photography, or any artistic endeavour. And I'm not apologising for this photographs shortcomings either, of which there are a few, ably pointed out by you and others.

 

But I am arguing for a realist, rather than idealist, definition of artistic norms. i.e. it is only through the standards set by experience can we understand what is good, excellent or otherwise. To set standards in the absence of such experience, i.e. require an abstract notion of 'perfection' is to me not an artistic norm at all, but rather a sort of fantasy.

 

So, I have no quarrel with you or other nature photographers saying this picture comes up short. To my eyes (and I'm more interested in people and street photography) this shot approaches a very high standard using a number of criteria such a a sense of moment, color, dynamic tension, similarity to a school of painting etc.

 

And thus, I give the major technical fault (the position of the second bird)a low weight in my summing up and I'm willing to let it go at that for my own purposes.

 

But you should set a higher standard if you are able, as long as it is a realistic standard.

 

I accept at face value your statement that there is a higher realistic standard for nature photography.

If this picture was in 3D-Vision, it easily could let me forget reality and have me to join these birds, regardless of 1/125 at f8 and 600mm (IS), hand held or not. Particularly today at the local temperature of 39 C. I would certainly find for it a place on my wall. Adelaide SA

Very well done, and you should be proud of this shot. Many who have written here liked your work, the rest I think are jealous.

I love the photo....I can feel the ocean spray on my face!

This photo has a great surreal quality to it. I wish there was more contrast between the right bird and the background but overall, I think this shot is fabulous. Gotta love those IS lenses!

There's a lot of shadow detail in this. The birds are in the perfect location there could be some minor improvements but it's hard enough to get people to pose the way you want them. Great moment captured. The muted colors look great.