The Wakatawa (War Canoe) 'Te Awatere Hou' (The New Dawn) at its dawn launching 1990

In 1990 the 150 year celebration for the founding of our bicultural

nation involved activities from many diverse groups, such as the

building and launching of Wakatawa (traditonal war canoes) that took

part in celebrations at Wiatangi, the site where the treaty between

the Maori people and the British Crown was signed in 1840. Comments

and critiques welcome as always,

I notice the clouds at the top right of the picture define a white line along the bow of the boat, and hills. Its just a strnge thing I noticed. I like the picture though.

Yes Joseph, It is the result of not too accurate masking in the darkroom while trying to balance the foreground against the rising dawn sun and get some detail in the boat. I have scanned this from an 8x10 print and have a large digital file. Perhaps I will resort to Photoshop to fix it! (Done now)

I like this picture so much. There are couple of minor things that would need improvement (like bright white areas in clouds and water) but generaly the picture is very good. Excellent composition... I've been to Waitangi several times so far, but never on Waitangi day...

I like this low angle shot, imo, the lower the better and the water shadow as foreground added much interest to this image.

A very good low-angle shot !!

I like the angle, the water, the cloudy sky and, last but not least, the b&w colors. unfortunately, you cut the bottom of the canoa

very nice pic, I love all in this picture: angle, clouds, reflections! Hope one day to come to N.Z. and meet you, Eryn!

nice... without the boats on the right side...and the white hat..will be very nice... we could really beleive on it... as an historical photo...

thanks for the comments, I feel it is nice to have a couple of items that put the time or period in history the image was taken in context Frederic as long as they are a little discreet.