The Enchanted Wood

Beautiful Autumn light yesterday in Buchan Wood,this is ancient

woodland that has been around loch Trool since Robert the Bruce

defeated an English force here in 1307.

Beautiful, Douglas!  The rays of light showing off the forest floor is perfect!

beautiful shot - hope you enjoyed your time there!

Cheers

PDE

Indeed, fantastic light. Very well captured. I find forests to be an exceptionally challenging subject, both as regards exposure and finding a strong subject. This photo works well on both counts. 

Very nice moment caught,light is special indeed here and creates a magic scene.

Wonderful light capture - magical and mystical!

Great image, beautiful colour and light rays, excellent image.

Really magic mood with wonderful light and lovely colors.

You nailed the light and position for the beams. The soft focus in the mist,then sharp on the clump of grass in the left foreground is perfect.

Very nice shot. I love the colors and atmosphere.

Doug, you have captured a feeling as much as an image. Congratulations! Some might criticize the saturation, but this

feels to me as being more about the fantastical than the natural; the ethereal and the imagined, while remaining rooted in

a real place and moment. I might not hang this on my wall, but it would be an outstanding illustration in Lord of the Rings.

Very well done.

I like the shot, but do wish it was less saturated and warm. I think this is a case of gilding the lily.

To me, the atmospheric quality of the image begins with the sun's rays penetrating the woods. The vivid colors - not oversaturated in my opinion - add to that quality. Doug's title really says more than I can.

I don't see it as artificially Saturated. In Colorado, I often shoot scenes that have incredible, naturally saturated colors. I think the altitude and sun angle results in some colors that would be "unreal" in other places that I've lived. With low angle, naturally filtered light, as in Doug's image, these colors seem "real" to me. Perhaps Doug feels like letting us know, maybe not, but that's okay.

It is the beauty of light and colors when they are rendered

finely beautiful on a digital sensor.I do not know if the

photographer have used a tripod or not, if he hasn't then it is

a great quality bicture and great sharpness for such a slow

shutter speed and a narrow tight lens opening all with a very

low ISO setting.

Regards.

A wonderful picture enhanced by the fact that you managed to find a viewpoint which separates the browns and greens along a diagonal. Some of the fuzzier greens I find a little disingenuous in an image which is otherwise pin-sharp (apart from the sun rays, obviously). Great to find an outdoor scene which is still uplifting at this time of year.

For me, this photo is best viewed as a personal memento of the photographer. Since it's a photo that's fairly standard in terms of rays of sun coming through a fall forest, though it's a perfectly reasonable rendition of it, it still doesn't do much for me, since I've seen this scene photographed so many times that these types of photos actually have lost much of their impact on me. For me, it's not a fresh vision of this type of scene. And yet I can understand anyone, including me, wanting to take one of their own, without it needing to be fresh or significantly different. But for those reasons, I think a lot gets lost in sharing it with others who may have seen so many of them. The degree of saturation, whether natural or not, doesn't affect my response.

Fred, you've travelled many more photographic miles than me!

It's lush... vivid and inviting
I feel good looking at it... that alone gives it value to me personally
a place one could visit through the changing seasons and never find it boring... there is comfort is such abundance
I like it

This is not an ugly setting as such and with considerable potential that I feel is not fully realised. To that aim the photographer has at least applied a more than usual technique. I am not a great fan of the Cokin plastic filters in view of their optical properties but he has used the soft gradation ND filter to one advantage in order to even out the light in the scene. My problem with the image is more akin to what Fred says, the type of photograph is oft seen and in any such cases the appealing subject becomes simply light rays and color swashes without greater visual interest. The colors may well be natural but they are to my mind obfuscated and denatured by the light rays. I have wonder what the organic subject really is, what is being shown that is different. Perhaps this would work better in less dramatic light where the nature of the subject could be better perceived and explored? Too much is present within the frame and yet I feel there is too little. A more subtle if also dramatic version might be in B&W, but I am not sure that would appeal to the photographer.

Frederick suggests that for him there is comfort in the abundance of matter in the scene. For me that abundance overshadows what might be in the scene and what I might draw from it. By converting to B&W I tried to eliminate the chromatic part of the abundance to see if that might unearth the subject more and allow me to explore it. While the light rays still mask the subject to some extent (unless they are perceived as The subject...) it does simplify the image a bit I think. The subject is still somewhat "hidden" for me and I do not see what is really different about this sort of composition.

Lovely scene, excellent composure and light rays.