compendium Flight (photo of original darkroom print)

Produced from two negatives, one (the violin) being exposed 13 times over previous

exposure of sky negative with masking about violin to avoid overexposing background

image. A photo of a photo copy of the original, thus not as good details of sky as

wished. Thanks for looking.

First of all, great idea, certainly interesting and different (to me anyway) and quite effective! However, by way of critique (since you asked) I have two thoughts, for what its worth: 1. I would have preferred the angle of the bottom line to match closer to the angle of the top line - more of a wider V, in point of fact. Although of course I appreciate the effort that you went to in creating this! 2. Although from your portfolio it seems you prefer black and white, I wonder if that effect would have been more striking in colour? That way, the eye would still be tricked initially by the shape (and think birds or planes) but then would quickly see the amusing juxtiposition and perhaps appreciate it all the more.

Thanks for sharing!

Anthea,

I like your critique. Colour was out as this is a darkroom manipulation from about 1988 (wow, time goes by so quickly, and although I love B&W darkroom today, I work more in digital) and I could not confidently manage the technique in colour. I have two reservations about the line of "birds", one being yours, the other being that I could not easily position the violins with their necks in a more forward manner. Both are related to the way the violins were added, not by the relative ease of Photoshop or similar digital tools, but by moving the easel slightly in the dark to imprint each violin, one after one. It took me 4 prints and a full evening to get one like this. The others had either overlapped or poorly spaced violins and/or errors in my masking.

Another improvement, if we can call it that, was that during selections and publication of Dr. M. Lessard and Mrs. F. Remillard's publication on 150 years of photography for the publishing house of Photo Selection, this image got printed upside down on the frontispiece page. I think the two historians thought it more revealing of bird form the other way round. Anyway, sorry for all this verbage and thanks for your welcome comments.   

Arthur -- An enchanting piece of fantasy.  Quibbles of angles and the like aside,  it speaks to me personally of the uplifting, soaring nature of certain works of classical music.

Steve,

Thanks for your reaction. The day that I thought about trying this I had seen a migration of snow geese which is a common sight at certain times of the year in spring and fall. I had also been listening to violin music the night before (Vaughan Williams' piece called "Lark Ascending", in which the violin soars continually upward, accompanied by the orchestra). 

It seems you've already identified a few ways you could have possibly improved on this.  Yet I still think it's a very clever and successful image.  Funny......'The Lark Ascending' is what immediately came to mind when I saw this.  I've performed the piece (I find it difficult).  For you to use it as your inspiration makes me enjoy it all that much more. 

Hi Christal,

Thank you for your comment and your relationship to Vaughan Williams' wonderful piece that you obviously know so well as concert violinist. I thought at one time of its possible use by our local orchestra (Quebec Symphony, or OSQ) at their 100th anniversary, but lacked the initiative or courage to suggest it. I would have appended the expression "Music is in the air" to that suggestion for publicity use. Whatever, it was fun to do it and to listen to "The Lark Ascending" while attempting to overlay the several independently added violin images on the sky background under the enlarger and under the imperfect vision afforded in the darkroom.