Creek 2, Matthaei Botanical Garden, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Love to hear your thoughts!

Has your style all over it Tim.

Tim... I'm liking your b/w technique but can't quite put a finger on what it looks like to me. My guess of Orton was incorrect :-). They (this and others in the current series) remind me of some vintage prints I've seen from box cameras, although most of those old shots have aged. This is a well captured shot of an ordinary stream, but the technique and the composition work well to add excellent depth... I think you've hit on a winner with this entire series... Mike

 

Mike - I really do like this look and it really looks great with snow. I've been trying it out with some of my older shots of various scenes and I really like the results. I'll post those later on. For now, I'll stick with winter. Really glad you like them. Have a great weekend.

HI Tim. I too love this style / feel to your images! Wonderful feel and glow.

Thanks Amey!

There's a sense in which your treatment of these snowy landscapes reminds me of the classic gauze look of Hollywood cinema and portraits from back in the 30s and 40s. That soft focus glow thing going on. For me, it has a very distinctive effect in exploring the unreal side of the very real subjects you're shooting. An almost heightened texture beneath a softening filter. It's funny, for me it gives the water a kind of solidity and the branches more fluidity. The low contrast handling seems to heighten the effect. It does have a very dreamlike quality.

I really like your reaction to this. I wanted to simplify the scene by toning down the details and focusing more on the bookends of the tonal scale to be the main compositional factors. This , for me, created more of a perceptual response. Instead of going for maximum sharpness and detail, I think the brain kind of "fills in the blanks". The snow, for instance, is white beyond detail, but I still see it as snow and my mind creates the look and feeling of snow. Lots of details in the trees and branches are softened. There's enough there to create the "perception" of trees and branches, but had I left absolute detail, the image would just be too busy. The whole scene gets interpreted for what it is, but on the surface, it's more of an assortment of tones. It really comes together when you step back from it and look. Much like a painting.