Bride

Just awesome!

Amazing! 

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You know, I really like the angle, I like the way the dress is flowing off the right and I like the bride's action here--problem is that I really don't like the image much.

I think it is just that the composition is so awkward and constrained. Even as an abstract, the flow is absent and it feels claustrophobic--and, well, just awkward. I think that use of the edges of the stairs and the nearly symmetrical side panels contribute to this. The right side isn't as big an issue for me as is the left. I think the veil/train flowing outside of the confines of the stairs would have made the shot more unified and maybe saved it.

Other than that, I like the tones but do feel that the white should have been tamed a bit near what I assume would be her knee level--the hotter spots on the right are ok but could probably have been muted a bit as well.

I like the idea but feel it did fall short a bit.

I *really* like it, but have to agree with John A about the blown area at knee height, and that in pple, the composition would be a bit better if the train could have been draped outside of the boundaries set by the vertical (in our view) wooden members. However, if she is indeed walking on stairs, the vertical pieces of wood are probably railings, and hence, draping the train over them might not have worked out well.

I also feel that there should be more tonal separation between the bride and the background. IMHO, while interesting, the bkgnd is somewhat busy. I would have darkened it as shown in the attached tweaked version, or even a bit more.

Not withstanding the above comments, I feel this is a beautiful, unique shot.

Tom M

I agree very much with Tom Mann. So much so that I feel that the tonal separation should be even more apparent and that the bride should be the only real focus in this shot. I'll post an example of what I mean.

The beauty of Carlos's work in general and this photo in particular is his lightness of touch. This photo has an ethereal quality. The bride is like a bird. And so the lightness of the processing seems an important part of the vision. It seems to me Carlos doesn't want heavy drama or great contrast, which appears to be in keeping with the subject matter and perspective.

Carlos has provided an easy gliding quality to the tonality (hi-key/mid-key), which is in tune with the flight of the bride down the stairs. Carlos has captured and rendered the dress and all its details (down to each floret) beautifully. The gown is clean, pristine, like snow, and with texture and all the florets in tact. Her cape billows and floats softly yet markedly. This photo, without overdoing it, really moves. The gesture and composition provide a sense of grace. There's an orderliness to the composition against which the bride is played beautifully. The perspective catapults me as a viewer.

____________________________

Both redone versions presented above are very different visions than Carlos's. They change the photo dramatically. It's always interesting to see what another photographer might do.

Tom's, frankly, looks heavy, dirty, actually muddy to me. The dress looks absolutely awful, like someone threw fresh soil at the gown instead of rice, and the whole picture becomes a messy downer.

Stan's direction is rather appealing to me, though very different from Carlos's, and I worry about how much detail was lost in the dress. I think the same effect might have been achieved with a somewhat less graphic result on the dress itself. Stan's version overall has an angelic quality. I like the sense of lighting he's introduced and also like the added texture and sense of tonality in the background details, especially the plants and flowers. The bride becomes more of a swirling mass here. There's drama without heaviness, which I like.

Fred, I was going for a more 'angelic' feel like you've said. Softening and blurring the highlights and really making her glow was a part of that. I thought it would help boost the unique feel of the original and give the eye fewer distracting details. Perhaps keeping the details would've been better composition-wise, I'm not sure.

I think the beauty is in the details here--the cream-colored flowers on the dress; the brown leaves alongside the steps--and if you blow out as much of the detail as Stan does in his example, you lose much of the beauty of the original photo.

Martin, I disagree. I think the beauty is in the amazing composition and idea. What really gets me about this photo isn't the flowers on her dress, it's the incredible idea of the photographer to shoot her at a unique angle and document this woman's grace and joy in an almost abstract way. I don't feel that the minor details are what matters here, that is why I stressed the overall feel of the photo, rather than the flowers or dress. I agree, I could have done a much better job, but I feel that this shot has remarkable potential and I wanted to post an example of what could be done to it.
Just my 2 cents,
Stan.

Fred, I think we both can agree that this is a very nice photograph.

However, you are simply wrong when you claim, "...rendered the dress and all its details (down to each floret) beautifully...". As several of us have pointed out, in his version, there are significant areas that are blown or nearly blown (ie, L > 95%), and this doesn't happen gracefully -- for example in the area near her knee, there is essentially no structure there. On my monitor, I can detect the difference between R=G=B = 254 and R=G=B=255, so these areas stand out to me like proverbial sore thumbs in an otherwise nicely done image. I'm really surprised that this problem didn't jump out at you as well. Perhaps there is a significant difference between out monitors and their calibration.

In addition, to my eye, the larger scale contrast structure of the dress, eg, the folds, look like they have been somewhat artificially enhanced through the use of the "clarify" slider or any of a variety of similar local contrast tools. I suspect that this is what is causing what I consider a less than optimal appearance of the dress around her torso (too cocoon-like there), but unusually shiny in the ridges between the indentations / folds.

You are correct when you note that I slightly darkened the dress in my tweaked version. This was my attempt to minimize the problems described above, and was also was my attempt to make the finer scale detail in the dress material visible. I think it is important to do the latter because, IMHO, it illustrates the contrast between the coarse, large-scale natural features of the wood and rock background with the very fine man-made textural details of the gown. If I understand your critique correctly, my slight darkening of the dress is what prompted your "...heavy, dirty, actually muddy..." description. To be honest, I'm somewhat surprised by your feeling that there was such a large change because the degree of darkening that I imposed on the dress was actually quite small (and can now be directly measured by all), but, to be honest, I would much rather err in this direction than not make some attempt to correct what was an obvious problem with the highlights.

The exposure of the dress was almost perfect, but not quite. If he had treated the highlights better, I probably would not have even bothered to make any changes in the brightness of the dress, and it certainly is possible that I used poor technique in my attempt to fix them. You obviously have a good eye and fine writing skills, but, I think what would be most useful to me and many other photo.net participants is if, in cases like this, you could actually illustrate your vision of how images submitted for critique should look. To use the terminology of patents, at some point, there has to be an actual "reduction to practice" of the theory for the theory to be useful.

Cheers,

Tom M

Stan - I just saw your post. I do understand your point and that of Fred about lightness, but I am obviously also in the same camp as Martin. Perhaps we the difference could be described as a difference in weighting the importance of the various features of an image ... large scale compositional aspects vs details.

Tom M

Tom, I think other photographers' work should look the way they want it to look. I don't rework others' photos. When I give a critique, I talk about what I see and often about what I like and dislike. I rarely make specific suggestions, preferring the photographer to read my comments and, if so moved, come up with his own solutions to any problem areas I may have talked about. If I make suggestions, I will often suggest a variety of ways to go and try to mention there are many ways that I haven't talked about. I don't like to influence others' specific decisions mainly because when I have been critiqued especially by other photographers who I consider more experienced than myself, they have been gracious enough to allow me to find my own voice with their observations rather than their specific suggestions. It's helped me grow tremendously as a photographer (sometimes actually forced me to grow when it would have been much easier for someone else to show me what to do) to find my own solutions to things.

The dress you have rendered has changed it SIGNIFICANTLY, IMO. It looks like a white dress that's been severely soiled. The fine netting through which we see her arms (and which also trails down the stairs) is no longer white. It's the gritty color of what you've done to the stairs behind her. The satin material of the dress itself just looks like gunk. That is my opinion, which is all I can give. I have no proof to offer and won't be posting the way I think it should look. I think it should look the way Carlos wants it to look. If, after reading various critiques, he is moved to alter it, then I would judge that on its merits. But I have no inclination to alter it myself.

Thanks, Tom. I don't agree with your "reduction to practice" conclusion when it comes to critiquing photos. When critiquing, theory (or, to be more accurate, suggestiveness and insight WITHOUT specific solutions or re-visualization) is the way I prefer to go.

If other photographers feel they'd like a frame of reference for my comments, they can of course look at my own work to get a feel for the kind of vision I have. When I read others' critiques, I often check out their portfolios. It helps me put their critiques in context and exposes me to their work, which is nice.

Fred, thanks for pointing out a specific area where you see such a large difference. Something very odd is going on. For comparison, I cut the section you specified out of the original and out of my tweaked image, offset them for ease of comparison and appended the result below. I can barely see a difference. Do you still see the effect you are describing? Do others?

Tom M

PS (in edit) - After staring at these two for a while, if anything, to me, the original (aka, "before") looks ever so slightly darker than my tweaked version !!!

And ... I just compared the "before" and "after" histograms of this area, and the peak of the histograms for the non-white areas are identical to my measurement ability, ie, the peak for both is 179 (out of 256) plus or minus one.

Any ideas, Fred?

Tom

FYI, I just repeated a similar analysis on the bride's train going down the (ie, viewer's) left side of the steps. In this region, I can see a small before-after difference: Specifically, my tweaked image has a bit more digital noise, undoubtedly an artifact from processing the low-rez, 8 bpc JPG original. Might that be what you are seeing? If so, I would comment that such an artifact would essentially disappear if I had started from a full rez, RAW or 16 bpc TIF original.

Tom

Fred just emailed me and suggested that he and I continue our detailed technical discussion via email so as not to derail this thread. I think that's a very appropriate suggestion. See y'all later.

Tom M

It's an interesting viewing angle. There is some beauty in the surrounding area. I also like the "Flow" of her gown. I don't find the knee area blown out in the original. I'm wondering if I wouldn't like this better as a straight B&W

It took me a few minutes (brain freeze?) to realize this is a street photo. As such, I'm amazed at what Carlos was able to capture.

But I don't really care for the photo at all. To me, the bride looks more like an insect to me than a bird, angel or bride.

And if I were the bride, I would hate the way this angle makes the hips appear so wide.

But it's the most unusual bridal shot I've ever seen and if unposed, as I suspect it was, then it's one terrific capture. Right place, right time, all the right technicals and superb color post-processing.

I like the shot. First off this is clearly not a "bridal" picture and not created to please the subject. It appears the bride is posing for another photographer, from a lower position, outside the frame. The carefully placed dress and woman's pose speaks to that. The high angle of this shot gives the image a strong, swooping graphic appeal that is accentuated by the powerful contrast of the surround-light/dark, rough/soft, old/new. The highlights on the dress don't bother me as that's what satin does. This took a quick eye to see this shot and recognize the interesting shapes and contrasts. I wish there was a bit more room at the top for better visual balance but perhaps that was cropped tight for reasons unknown. Overall a successful image.

Well, finally. A non-traditional wedding photo that doesn't look cute or posed to look non-traditional.

I'm not seeing the problems with tones that some other people are seeing. I see excellent separation between the bride and her surroundings. I also disagree that the dress and train could've been "arranged" or "draped" better. This doesn't appear to be a shot that was set up in advance, it doesn't look posed. I love the movement, not to mention the sense of joy and abandonment here.

Someone mentioned the angle makes the bride's hips look wide. Maybe they are wide...so what?

I actually look at this as a frame within a frame, with the outstretched arms and parts of the dress breaking the edges of the interior frame. I love the contrast between the curves of the bride and her dress and the sharply defined angles and lines of the staircase and railings.

The detail is marvelous, right down to the nails in the railings and the tiny rocks among the larger ones at bottom left...also the detail in the surrounding rocks and foliage.

This has everything I look for in a photograph, and it continues to hold my interest each time I look at it. I can't ask for more than that.

like a glorious bird in flight, Carlos; and the tone is mystical and mythical and magical. lyrical, dramatic movement.... i especially luv the way you've captured the sheerness of the veil and train; you've done justice to a glorious gown. beautiful, even so if she is a runaway bride LOL! bravo! ;-} dp

Every now and then a truly WOW photo shows up. This is one of those. A fresh and wonderful point of view. It conveys wonderful emotion. It is aesthetically pleasing regardless of subject. It is truly inspirational.

I like the image. Rather than as a bird, angel, but yes a bride, and I see something of what Alberta sees when she says the bride looks like an insect while I get the feeling more that she looks like she is a negative fairy tale figure, about to stir a pot or take to flight as her stiff outstretched arms suggest slightly. Her head is down, not up, which may be why to me it doesn't suggest bliss or joy. Somewhat confusing: her body is headed down the stairs but her dress is already there. Am I missing that instead of heading down the stairs she is twirling in place?