'For Anna G. on Graduation from Medical School'

This is a special dedicated posting to commemorate the graduation of a

special friend to whom lighthouses have special meaning and also my

return to paid status on Photo.net. Lighthouse on San Mateo, CA, USA

coast, Pacific Ocean with typical low clouds. Your ratings, critiques

and observations are invited and most welcome. If you rate harshly,

very critically or wish to make a remark, please submit a thoughtful

and constructive comment; please share your photographic knowledge to

help improve my photography. Thanks! Enjoy! john

John,

This is an awesome image and immediately got my eye as I was browsing PN this morning.  It has excellent colors and detail.  Also, I really like your composition.  Bravo!

Few know me as a landscape photographer.

That's possibly because just one photo takes so much time to set up and go to; though this was 'just in passing' as I was driving by.  I decided to stop and see what I could do.

This WAS a dull everyday photo until I applied some basic Photoshop skills which I have newly found - basic stuff every successful landscape photographer knows, but which I have ignored during nine years here, so focused am I on compositional values and black and white photography.

But when I set out to do something, I try to do it right.  This photo is quite old and represents a brief encounter, but even then I tried to 'do it right'.

Basic composition in everything and/or 'keep it interesting' in the capture is my guiding light,  I'm glad this one interested you.

A critique from a ten year member deserves special thanks.

john

John (Crosley)

If I were a painter, this is how I'd try to frame and paint the scene, though with far fewer details.

I'd especially try for the colors in the beach; those muted reddish values which are hard to see on the Photo.net posting but when viewed on a home screen are quite stunning but very, very muted.

john

John (Crosley)

I too like the composition. The elevated position of the lighthouse gives the impression that it both surveys and dominates the scene, and for me thats how it should be.  The sharpness and colour are also appealing elements of the image. I would have done one thing slightly differently and I stress this is a personal preference. I would have used a very slightly slower shutter speed and timed the wave to take the shot as it receded, this I feel would have conveyed a certain amount of movement and life to the scene, rather than a frozen in time impression. Very subjective I know.

Best Regards

Alf

I greatly respect your analysis of this photo and am glad you enjoy it --  especially its composition.

I also respect your idea of how its composition might have been changed by taking the wave as it receded, but have you thought it through?

This is a photo, and we know from Greek that photograph is writing with light.

This sea here as it comes in is loaded with bright foam.

If it were receding, it would partially be soaked into the sand and mud and certainly would have lost almost all its frothiness and as a result also its lightness/brightness.

What would remain would be a darkly receding mass of eddies and little whirlpools (small whirlpools that sink into various little air holes in the sand and mud -- mostly sand.) 

One who has walked on such a beach knows they are loaded at anything below highest tide mark with thousands and thousands of little air holes for creatures that dwell in the sand -- some are from sand shrimp and a few others for clams (not many now of course) but hundreds of other creatures. 

These creatures are either filter feeders or air breathers and need to have the water coursing through, and as such they have tubes through which water is sucked in as it courses over them.  The result is that when a wave washes over, a good part of it is sucked right into the sand/mud, taking away its luminescence.

Thus when the wave washes out, it is stripped of its luminescence including much of its corpus -- it partly washes away under and through the sand and what's left courses and eddies in ripples and currents -- far from being very photogenic under this light.

That receding water might well be interestingly photographed, but not under this light and photographing a receding wave would remove the values that the strong light foam adds to the color/tonal balance to this photo.

For kicks, look at this photo in black and white, then imagine it with receding wave and I think you'll see this difference.

In other words, it's not just receding the wave, the light/tonal values would change so much the entire composition would be destroyed and would have to be reworked.

The reworked composition might be wonderfully successful, but that would be a completely new photo.

I'm providing a black and white attachment, (full size) so you can envision this as a black and white photo without having to experiment yourself, then try to imagine the white wave foam removed and the receding water in ripples, currents and tiny, little whirlpools.

I hope you respect that this entire analysis shows great respect for your analysis so that I have taken the time to analyze it, even if I ultimately reject it (without reworking the entire composition).

Best to you this U.S. birthday.

john

John (Crosley)

I didn't address the issue of the slow shutter speed and the receding wave.

I know from watching time lapse images of water in such stalwart publications as B&W Magazine where I think they first became fashionable, that time images of water are becoming by now a cliche.

If I were the first, then that's one thing, but aside from luminescence issues (discussed above), I am reluctant to slow my shutter speed; my captures depend on, say getting the foam to end exactly at the right corner of the frame, and that's not easily (perhaps at all) possible with a time exposure.

I think time exposures, apart from risking becoming today's cliche, are very attractive, but this was taken before they became a cliche - six or eight years ago.  It never passed my mind, nor would it today if I were to take it, and if it did, I would reject it, for framing/compositional (and luminescence) purposes.

I might reposition and attempt something a little different, to try your idea and I'll keep it in mind next time I shoot something like this.  Your idea has merit; I just don't see it for this photo.  I'm still anxious to give time exposures a workout just because . . . .

Thanks for your contribution.

john

John (Crosley)

Thank you for your in depth analysis, of my analysis!  It was interesting to read your views.  Just to qauntify and perhaps clarify my original observations to some degree. When I refer to a "slower shutter speed"  I am talking 1 - 2 seconds and not the 30 second "cliche" type images that I think  you may be referring to.  I did think about my comment before I made it, I don't think a frivolous casual comment helps anyone, and I give serious consideration to any suggestions I make before I make them, based on my knowledge and personal experience. Now whilst I feel inadequate to comment on the technical merits of your "Street" images, I think I have enough experience to envisage to a fairly accurate degree, the effect of the shutter speed as I have described. I take on board your comments about the foaming white surf, but I dont think that would be lost. The problem is here I have a very clear idea of what it would look like with the slightly slower shutter speed and you also have your own ideas of how it would look. The best way foward would be for me to give an example of what I am trying to convey in words. This link might help, although this shutter speed is perhaps slightly slower than what I had in mind, but It's all about timing the wave.

http://gallery.photo.net/photo/10738410-lg.jpg

As you can see, much of the luminescence and light has been retained to a large degree. Please be assured I only attached the link as a visual example of the effect I was trying to describe in order that we are both "singing from the same hymm sheet" , and not with a conceited motive of showing "this is how its done" Not a great example, but just something we can both refer to. The one element that cannot be compared is the prevailing light, as it is difficult to know the exact conditions based only on observations of a photograph.

Interesting thing about cliched images, is that they only became cliches, because people found them attractive in the first place. Like sunsets and reflections and rainbows, I suppose there are numerous photography styles and situations that would fall into the cliches category.  Personally I will take a photograph of something I find attractive, if it falls into someones perception of a cliche, then so be it. The element of its original attraction is not diminished in my eyes simply because someone deems it a cliche.

The purpose of my original comment though, was for you to maybe consider the options next time a similar situation arises and you have indicated that you will.................so job done I guess.

Cheers John!

Alf

You have given a thoughtful critique and posted a wonderful photo; thank you for taking the time and effort.

First thing is this photo was taken long ago and before Photoshopping it was pretty dull, and I did not have Photoshop skills to bring it to its proper potential until recently, and frankly long ago just passed it over.

Since that time the delayed shutter technique has come into vogue, and I find it both ethereal and lovely.

But it's just not for this photo.  You posited the slower shutter speed for the water washing out and I countered that it would lower the illumination and make the intersection of the wave with the frame (lower right) problematic at least.

I concede that illumination with lots of Photoshopping may not be a huge problem, though I am sure it would require much photoshopping, but the composition will not withstand the receding wave; that's for 'standing water' and this is active water, frozen in a moment.

The technique you use creates a more ethereal look, somewhat misty and less harsh, but that's not the look I am after in a shot like this.

I wanted the harshness of the sharp edges of the foam, like foam is illustrated more by Japanese illustrators than Western illustrators -- in other words, some severe harshness.  Your technique prevents that.

Interestingly, I had in mind when responding an image precisely almost to a 't' like your and may indeed have had your image in my mental/visual inventory when writing.

It is NOT the look that I felt would have helped me (had I know it was possible) for this photo.  But this photo predates the active use of that technique's popularity, I think.

Still, I am anxious to master that technique, but it requires a tripod, and I am seldom found with a tripod that can be extricated from the detritus of my auto.  I just do not like tripods, except when using a Wemberly with huge telephotos, but they're necessary for time exposures, even of 2 or 3 seconds.

I appreciate the good spirit and intelligence of your critique, and you have made your point well, even teaching me something about exposure times, as I had thought the technique required much longer exposures, so I am enlightened.

I am looking forward to trying the your techniques next time I have a tripod, an opportunity, and some time in a similar circumstance.

Best to you.

Thanks!

john

John (Crosley)