'Passages'

'Passages' is submitted as 'street' but might also have been submitted

as 'fine art', but it matters little. Your ratings and critiques are invited

and most welcome. If you rate harshly or very critically, or just want to

be heard, please submit a helpful and constructive comment; please

share your photographic knowledge to help improve my photography.

Thanks! Enjoy! John

Not as strong as strong as this one, but nevertheless an incredible capture. Somehow it reminds me of this other one. I dont't think here there was much space for "standing there, just pressing the camera release at high speed", am I right?

Here your ability to react fast to vanishing scenes is shown, once again.

This is one of the first photos I took yesterday (Monday) during a 3-1/2 hour solo outing.

 

I've been taking so many photos lately I took today OFF just to process a few of them and so far have done ten, or fewer, but first class (I hope).

 

There was a political rally Saturday I happened upon on the way to an inexpensive restaurant (with two cameras and four lenses) and wandered with friend among 100,000 or so attendees, taking some great photos but alas, only one 8 gig chip per camera which 99% of the time is enough but occasionally I could use 3 per camera (all 8 gigs). It just depends, and I don't want to let anything go away.

 

This was taken just after I backed into an oogle (rhymes with Google, and means 'corner' in Russian, and back to the wall, all of a sudden strides in great leaps and bounds the guy right, and my D300 with 17-55 mm f 2.8 w/ firing at max (with the big battery, so 8 frames a second except for considerable shutter lag from slower exposures).

 

This may be the 50th or 100th time I've walked in or through this major juncture and never figured out to take a photo of BOTH stairways, but I love side lighting and here is two sources.

 

I am without my usual 12-24 and I've been buying lenses like crazy fixed and zoom all pro level lenses with fast apertures to replace stolen ones. I'm getting to be a fixture at certain sales places and wish I were in Central (Bay Area) California so I could visit more often my camera store friends in Palo Alto (Keeble and Shuchat)

 

The second linked photo was taken two blocks away, just up the Metrograd (not Metroplitan but the vast Metrograd underground shopping complex which you may mot know underlies two of Kyiv's most broad and 'important streets' unknown to pedestrians on the streets who are not 'clued in').

 

I wasn't for a long time, and when I saw Metrograd beneath the two streets, my jaw flipped open. (or is that flapped?)

 

I've taken a few photos of note at the entrances or walkways, and of course they connect to the real Metro below, but this is a separate entity's entrance which can be followed to the real Metro entrance (just for the sticklers as this obviously is 'underground' in any sense of the word (Lower Case -- not upper).

 

Luca, your words of praise here are the 'gold standard' or better yet, the 'platinum standard', and I know that no one gets favors from you for any reason. and just the same from me about rating at least.

 

The few things I rate, I rate honestly, and no mate rating at all (because no one ever expected a rate from me.;~))

 

Thank you for kind words of praise; after first ratings on both photos came in my heart sank -- 4/4 and 4/5 from some Yahoo I think looking for flower photos, over-saturated sunsets, or maybe the current cliche -- time exposure ocean on rock.

 

Both also are in my estimation some of my best and more to come (like my friend Giuseppe Pasquali who also is 'hot, hot, hot' these days), after a summer of illness (mostly preventable except some insurance company screwed me).

 

I am back, and with a vengeance.

 

Kind regards from a devoted admirer of your critical skills. (no brown nosing either if you know what I mean).

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

I've always liked your work. The ones I stop at are often yours, not because they say J.C. but because they simply catch my attention. Some guy named 'fast' also consistently catches my eye, just keeps jumping out. Keep at it.

Yet another brilliant one from your camera. This image throws open so many possibilities that there is no point speculating on one or two stories. The perfect play of light and shade creates a lot of mystery. You ALWAYS seem to be in the right place at the right time. Yes, time...that is it. You have this amazing knack to capture the event as it takes place. And at the right second too!! Imagine what would have happened if the men were further apart or even closer (by 3-4 steps). I think a lot of the tension would have been lost. A perfect choice for b/w. Regards.

Thanks for expressing approval, not just at this,but at the body of my work (or much of it). I'm pretty overwhelmed.

 

From time to time i get a photo I want to be remembered for; this and the other Luca A.Remotti wrote about above, taken yesterday,are two of them (in one outing -- three blocks apart, but separated by a 20 km trip)

 

Thanks so much.

 

I'll keep trying hard -- even harder -- to earn your trust.

 

John (Crosley)

I agree, but I will say in defense of being named 'superior' that my camera was on C' drive, so I have at least 3 superior images from this series.

 

I believe in something i call 'predictive human behavior', position myself for that, and aim my camera for that.

 

[The previous week, I saw a cookie counter. I saw a boy far away. I aimed my camera at the cookies low down where a boy could stare at them. Soon enough the boy came along and stared longingly and touchingly ever so close to the cookies that you could taste him imagining them, all captured with ease with my camera pre-focused, exposure set and firing away. ;~))) ] [predictive human behavior]

 

You see a guy running, (or I do), and I aim my camera their direction and start firing. You cannot know for sure what you'll get but no other photographer gets those shots; I'm just prepared.

 

Runner means my camera is pointed, and maybe firing. Here I was pre-positioned, only by seconds. (how fortuitous).

 

Be careful writing or my head will get swelled further.

 

You say more in your critique than I could write so I'll just incorporate it; and it explains my work for me 'in your words', as you understand it so well.

 

Thanks so much for words of encouragement.

 

Sometimes it seems I can't take a popular image for anything then i get 'hot' (popularly anyway, though not for personal thought).

 

Be well and keep contributing.

 

John (Crosley)

When I 'see' well, my 'heart' always is in my photography.

 

Where, then, you say, is the 'heart' in this photo; it has no 'social message?'

 

The answer is that my heart and soul are into the capture of this, just for the interplay of light and dark and the placement of figures, just so.

 

I don't always need a 'social message' to put my heart and soul into something.

 

This almost pure graphic elements - the 'art' and the 'moment' captured of this justify it in my estimation, the only one that really counts when I, an amateur, go out onto the streets.

 

I share because many seem to enjoy my work, for which I thank them, but nobody can say such work is 'heartless' and if they say so to themselves (no commenter has said so), they'd just be shortsighted.

 

This portfolio abundantly displays my 'heart and soul' - just look throughout and do NOT just look at 'most viewed' photos, but in this portfolio that is a substantial problem as viewers do not always rate photos that even might be great or very worthwhile .. . . enough to garner a place on that long page.

 

John (Crosley)

 

(in anticipation of reaction)

Really beautiful work, John!

Special notice from you is all I could hope for, ever.

 

John (Crosley)

Great shot ! I like it !

Best regards, Mircea

This being a critique forum on a photo site, one can analyze, even overanalyze to death, a photo, when sometimes all you need to say is what you just wrote.

 

Thank you.

 

John (Crosley)

Excellent compo, wonderful play of light, story, b/w, J.C. at his best...

 

 

 

 

Thanks (I think)

 

Is that, however, like Tanya Harding at her best?

 

Remember she had a boyfriend hit Nancy Kerrigan, famed ice skater, in the legs to try to injure her to get her to drop out of Olympic Competition that Tanya Harding was competing for.

 

;~))

 

I'm a wordsmith, after all, and play with words.

 

I have a hard time still believing there's a 'John Crosley Photo' - I take so many of all sorts.

 

But I accept your compliment, though from you it humbles me.

 

Greatly.

 

Thanks (this time no caveat).

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

Wow! Luca sure had alot to say about this image! I didn't read it but I'm assuming he was singing it's praises! I love everything about this! It jumped right out at me as I was scrolling down. Powerful in every respect!

Well done!!!

Jody

The extensive remark you read was not Luca Remotti, who was indeed laudatory, were probably MY typical extensive remarks about my own photo -- something I do fairly often, in response to an able critic such as Luca Remotti.

 

It was titled with his name, so it is easily seen that you may have mistaken his name for the actual author - go back and see if I'm correct in my assumption, would you?

 

In any case, I'm glad that this graphically exceptional photo -- really a one of a kind -- impressed you so much.

 

One can take hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands and maybe millions of photos and rarely get such an opportunity.

 

It is a challenge to be bold enough to back one self into a corner in an underground passageway with a photoapparat (camera/lens) to stand there (not long actually - really a pretty short time, remarkably), to get a photo such as this.

 

In such a circumstance, and with a guy running like this, you have to make the decision that I have been making for a very long time - when someone moves, do not think, just fire away.

 

That is to say, when I've set up a photo and someone walks across the frame, I often find myself firing.

 

And quite often those photos are awful but a few of them are stunning. It's well worth it to take photos that feature sharp figures and blurry ones, or distinct walls and floors (as here) and indistinct human figures (also as here).

 

It's the contrasts, stupid (as Clinton might have worded it in his first Presidential campaign).

 

What I have found out I do so often is create clarity by creating the illusion of greater sharpness in one thing or another by creating a contrast - the sour frown of a balloon vendor, contrasted with the inversely corollary smiles on the balloons within balloons next to him he's vending.

 

The tall, healthy, robust, attractive woman striding in a partial blur down the shopping boulevard with bags in hand next to the bent old woman in housecoat, frail, purse on arm, hand on cane, trudging next to her, slowly and in great sharpness (because of her slow speed) down the same boulevard's sidewalk.

 

The old man with faint smile and twinkle in his eye, facing camera but bent, with huge mural photo of two smirking woman behind him, appearing to be making fun of him and his age (and experience?)

 

And so on.

 

(just to name three)

 

In a similar vein, this is another.

 

The sharpness and clarity of the paving stones, and tile walls and ice pads/screens contrasts with the indistinctness of the figures, who, while somewhat sharp, are represented mainly by blackness and silhouettes.

 

Contrasts.

 

Like unsharp mask in Photoshop (or in the wet darkroom) which creates the illusion of contrast to increase the appearance of sharpness.

 

Whether illusion of reality, that's what many of these photos do; they create the appearance of sharpness by their contrasts.

 

The 'point' in each may differ, but, helped by good graphics (not every photo has splendid graphics of course, not even a fraction), such photos can be very stunning to look at.

 

The problem is finding opportunities to make 'em.

 

They're rare indeed.

 

You can't make 'em in the darkroom.

 

And it's hard to spot 'em on the street; rarer to capture them.

 

Thanks so much Jody.

 

I hadn't thought this though before your remark and I started to reply.

 

(so I'm marking this and remarks of mine above © 2009, John Crosley, all rights reserved.)

 

John (Crosley)

There is almost a ghostly feel to this. Leaves one feeling a little moved and wanting to know more.

Helpful comment. 

 

Thanks.  I'll try it on for size.  It 'feels right'.

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

Dear John,

Splendid! You do that next time.

I like a lot this composition, great timing.