Winter Lace 2

This image was modified from its previous version that can be find at http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=1411629. Basically, I tried to follow suggestions made by Marc Gouguenheim to improve integrity of the image (see tech detailes). I'd be interested in feedback, so your opinions and ratings are greatly appreciated.

Gotta' love it, great shot.

A pleasant image and a good idea.

The snow looks rather gray and is somewhat lost against the gray sky.

I still like the other one better. The inner frame was unique. That's just my humble opinion!

A little joke first... I agree with Ann somehow: in the other version the frame was indeed unique - but now, the picture is ! :-)

Ann, just an amusing way to disagree: don't get me wrong, no offense meant at all.

Now, back to the picture... The comment above about the snow not really standing out on this grey sky was interesting, and me look at the picture again with that in mind... And here's what I noticed... The center top portion of the sky is white and the snow stands out "fairly" well there, because it is grey... But then if I look down and left side, I can now see something I didn't notice yesterday, which is that the sky is no longer white in that area, and rather grey. So for the bottom left part of the image, I'll have to agree with this comment above: snow does not stand out as much there... It leads me to wonder why there would be such a drastic difference of the tone of the sky between top center (or bottom center at the root of the branches) and then the sky on the left side... Is there any PS manipulation (such as dodging in the central area or such) that would explain this strange difference...? Besides this I'd give this a well deserved 6/6, but that's now really bothering me somehow... Looking forard to hear the explanation on this strang difference in sky tones. Regards.

I DEFINITELY prefer the other one... That frame was what caught my attention, just for beeing *simply different*. This version, although still nice, is just another "tree with snow" shot. And that makes it an ordinary shot.

Very very nice composition.

Thanks to all fellow photonetters for commenting and rating on the image.

 

Nestor, it's again a continuation of a discussion what to consider original. I understand, that this kind of a tree may look somehow familiar, however if you compare it with others it just RESEMBLANCE.

 

Fractal? Thanks for compliment, Michel, never thought about it.

 

Marc, I can find only two explanations. First one can be under-rotated polarizer. Another one maybe as follows, I noticed, that my Canon G2, even without polarizer, produces higher densities along the borders, and on white background it sometimes looks like a blue halo. I don't know if it's specifically this certain camera feature, or it depends on lighting, or just typical for this kind of 'Canon lens'. Anyway, a solution might be either to correct in PS, or, as I intended from the beginning, more tight cropping. Below is attached a version of cropping I rejected to upload. I posted more complete frame instead.

Interesting, this camera story about the G2. I've never heard of anything like that before. At that stage, I can only leave it at that.

Another issue: your close-up... Yes !! Even better. The problem we were talking about is still there, but less flagrant, and I like that composition even better - at least at internet size, because it allows me to immerse myself into the details of the branches - which I find outstanding...

Besides that, on the framing issue, it was just my opinion. When Nestor and others say that the frame is what made it unique, again, I personally think that the shot was unique enough as a photo, without using graphic design or frame-maker enhancements, but why not after all. Best regards.

beautiful!

Previous version collected similar ratings, so it was deleted and can be seen below.

The discussion about the version deleted can be checked out here.

This is a nice tree shot. I like the snow on the branches. Winter is a great time of year.