Morning, December 31st, 2015

Very interesting street photo with a message across. Very nicely seen and composed, well done!

Awesome composition, as usual. Great bw.

Great composition and a very interesting scene. The tones are to my liking as well. The masked lady says it all, big city living, hustle and bustle, power lines and skyscrapers everywhere. Love it..............BR, holger

Hi Jack,

Really good work ,

A lot of nicely composed elements,

BTW ,Perfect 'eye contact' which grabs a lot of viewer's attention,

Finally there is still a lot of time to analyze all of other very interesting parts of the image,

Regards,

ZT

The scene is not inviting to me at all. Lots of concrete, pavement, steel, tall fences, small windows, utility lines, a sign saying 'don't do this'. A lone boxed-in tree without leaves. The only humans are moving away from the viewer, back turned and head down, or glancing perhaps warily from behind a mask. It just comes across as not very friendly or soothing to the soul. I see ginkgo leaves painted on the utility pole, which I assume are advertising something, but they come across as a vain attempt to introduce something organic to the environment.

Panayotis, Marie, Holger, Zbigniew, Mark..............Thanks for taking the time to comment on this picture. I'd like to take the opportunity here to answer Mark's comment. I pretty much agree with his assessment. I've lived in Osaka for 30 years now and it seems a city in a constant state of knocking down and building up. As in other big cities, the cohesiveness of the neighborhood is steadily being eroded by commercial-minded interests. There is a palpable and growing coolness between people. We are guarded and emotionally separated from each other and often seek anonymity and distance. I'm sure the increasing feeling of social alienation is reflected in this picture. It's the environment I live in every day; how could it not be? I am an observer and have my own thoughts which I have shared with you here. I don't consciously editorialize with my pictures. I simply observe and try to compose an interesting picture but they certainly reflect the way I look at the world, which I guess is true for most of us.

I really like this. I like to think that her eyes are still smiling. --Lannie