Jumping and Geometry II

A flight of geometrically aligned steps and a little girl, one minute

of waiting and voila. There is is. The first shot of the little

girl; the third shot of the steps. (I was prepared to wait for hours

for some agreeable composition and walked away after a few minutes

saying 'that's it -- got my photo'). Your ratings and critiques are

invited and most welcome. If you rate harshly or very critically,

please submit a helpful and constructive comment; please share your

superior photographic knowledge to help improve my photography.

Thanks! Enjoy! John

On analysis, it appears that the leftmost point of this girl's image is one-third of the way between the left and right of the photo -- a variation on the so-called 'rule of thirds', a rule I most often break, but every once in a while it works (even if it works on the left-to-right plane rather than the top-to-bottom plane as usually used with landscapes).

 

For whatever it's worth, when I spied these steps and figured out where to stand, it was just a matter of time for something, but this little girl was playing, and I was astonished by how quick this photo came about -- all shooting of her (her placement) done by reflex. This is the first shot of the little girl, not the middle of a continuous drive burst.

 

John (Crosley)

 

Copyright 2007, All rights reserved, John Crosley

When I was 21 or 22 (my birthday came there someplace), I took a photo of a jumping boy with background of angular buildings and a gymnasium and titled it 'Jumping and Geometry'.

 

It is on display at the start of this folder.

 

This is just a continuation on that vision I had when I was first shooting (then abandoned this craft for 30+ years.)

 

John (Crosley)

Whatever the genre within the B&W folder in which this is placed, I think this is really the best I can do, using 'pure geometry' and 'street' together.

 

No matter what the ratings.

 

I cannot imagine doing much better -- although maybe I can equal it some time or have equalled it in the past.

 

I can do as well in other parts of this genre, and have done so recently, but this is singular in my opinion for its place in the ' pure geometry'/'street' genre.

 

I hope you enjoy, because I was carrying two D2X(s) cameras with around my neck; and it's still sore and my back aches ;~))

 

John (Crosley)

Jeez John, nice shot, but are you writing a book on this? Keep up the shooting!

I am a writer as well as a photographer.

 

I intend to write about photography and indeed, my own photography.

 

You might see my Presentation: Photographers Watch Your Background, for an introduction to something that began as a Presentation and when whittled down easily could become a book, after reorganization (that reorganization is prevented by PN Presentations creation software.)

 

Indeed, it is interaction with my many critiques and commentators that has given me such insight into my own shooting that I now can write about it, whereas before I just went out and shot . . . and couldn't explain what I did.

 

Now I not only can explain what I do, I think I can teach certain others to do it as well.

 

'Street' may be something inchoate, but it's also a talent that can be developed and, given the right teacher, I think it can be taught.

 

Give the Presentation a try and see if it gives you any insight. It is a work in progress/not added to since about a year ago, and not to be changed, I think until I talk to some publishers.

 

Thanks for he encouraging words, though, about my photography.

 

John (Crosley)

Great capture and subject.

 

bryan

Thanks for the vote of confidence.

 

Ratings began with 6s and after a long while, deteriorated to 4s, and I am not sure why, but that's vox populi.

 

(Ed.: I'm glad this one pleased you so much -- it's really one of my best involving 'geometry' and 'street', and I think your rating - in this case is justified . . . . at least I can see that someone might rate this that way . . . , so thanks. I might have been so inclined if I were rating this photo and another photographer took it.)

 

Thanks!

 

John (Crosley)

I went by this place today and thought "well, I might be able to get another 'cool capture'", but really nothing was possible. These steps are so short that if an adult walks on them, their head will be out of the frame or their body otherwise not captured in full -- the steps just are not that extensive.

 

So, it appears, that unless one wants to show feet descending or ascending, or similar 'body parts' or workers working on these steps, say, cleaning, a small child cavorting is about the best photo one is going to get on them.

 

And I got my photo on the third shutter release.

 

I could have stood their hours or days and not got this photo (but knowing their potential for producing a fine photo, I might indeed have stayed at these stairs for hours instead of minutes, and indeed stood there for tens of minutes, until the light became too weak.

 

Also, the time of day, (here sundown) had a great deal to do with lighting and shadow, with clearer skies. This began as color of mostly gray, and it only was right to fully desaturate it, especially since the girl had on a light rose sweater. . . . which did NOT make for a good color photograph.

 

John (Crosley)

 

 

The kind where you move the page but change the stick figure and the figure moves.

 

I love the angles of the stairs and would love the picture without the girl just for the abstract look. BUT, with the little girl it gives it LIFE! ZOOM, zoom ~ I feel her go! Great job capturing her and nobody else on the stairs. I love this in black and white as color would not do it justice.

 

This would be a great place to just sit and click all day and have a book of all the people walking up and down right here.

 

~ micki

In fact, I have gone back to this place to photograph, and it's interesting, but it's short enough (or not high enough) that if one captures an adult, one gets only part of a body, so maybe only feet and legs descending, the upper half of a body, or simply a body so large it appears 'wrong' in context with the steps.

 

In short, (excuse the expression) a short person - child - is what works here, and little else, though I'll return probably several times and keep on trying.

 

Thanks for sharing your insights.

 

John (Crosley)

ah...those effortless, perfectly timed photos are the best, aren't they? The best thing about them is that they are so difficult to copy or improve upon.

"I really love that shot that I did of the dog and the car...if only that power pole weren't there!"...this one is so right on, just as it is. If you had camped at this spot for a day, this probably would have STILL been the star shot.

My lovely tiffany of the irregular septagonal shower fame -- I think if I camped out there a month, I am not sure I could have taken a photo so good.

 

I saw the girl go down the steps, planted myself, and framed the steps and with one eye open around my camera viewfinder -- (sounds like it's on a stalk doesn't it?) spied the girl start to cross the frame with my second eye through the viewfinder and hit the shutter release just as she crossed the extension of the line of each set of steps.

 

Couldn't have asked for better.

 

Effortless; to an amateur it would seem so (but I am an amateur -0- but that derives from the French -- 'amore' and before that the Latin 'amat' or some such, I can remember conjugating it in Latin Class in front of Ms. ('amor' amas', 'amat' and so forth) 'Death Breath' Gray, who smoked so much between classes in the teachers' lounge, she was immortalized by this nickname.

 

She'd stick her face in yours, pucker her lips and ask you the meaning of a certain word in Latin -- pushing that awful smokey, cigarette ashtray breath at you -- and of course the word would be 'kiss'), and she would have to make hints several times, (expelling severely stale cigarette smoke at your nostrils each and every time. Any session with 'Death Breath' Gray was followed by much grimacing -- immediately after she turned her back . . . and a slight collective giggle from the class (this WAS Latin class, after all, full of 'serious' students AND she was a formidable person for all her slight 5'2" when she's already getting gray hair and made no bones that she'll punish anyone who gets out of line.

 

'Now, John, WHAAAAAAAT (expelling of breath to my nostrils directly in her line of fire) is Latin for 'effortless capture?'

 

Well, I do remember some of her Latin, but remember her breath far more . . . . as it was legendary in Theodore Roosevelt Junior High School for more than one generation.

 

But 'effortless'?

 

In a sense that everything flowed smoothly, but I'd defy any amateur who has little training in 'street' to go out and take such a photo, and get it right or anything really good at all, in three shots -- or even many more.

 

In fact, when I saw those steps they yelled at me 'photo opportunity', but to a rank amateur they might have been something to climb down, to get to the supermarket at their base.

 

(How quaintly ex-Soviet -- putting a supermarket at the base of a group of steps . . . just so nobody with a disability could get in or out and for certain and no shopping cart would disappear (if it were extant in Soviet times which ended in 1991, Christmas Day. The supermarket may have appeared afterward - who knows?)

 

As to 'effortless' -- then again, sometimes the moon, stars and plants are all in conjunction (lined up correctly).

 

Come back more often, please tiffany. I miss your contributions.

 

John (Crosley)

This one of those 'I hardly believe I got it' photos.

 

You try and try for photos like this (however raters like or didn't like it) and then one day, 'BAM!', you look at you review screen, and there it is, dead on, but still uncorrected in Photoshop.

 

Here it was 'color', and the girl was wearing a very light, pinkish or rose sweater, which detracted horribly in color; so desaturation was all that was left.

 

No one probably would look twice if it were in color; desaturation certainly has a place.

 

And of course, black and white is undergoing a renaissance, now, too -- good luck for me!

 

John (Crosley)

at last a good one for me! (I'll not repeat my preferences hehe) 7/7

yes John, I think you caught the intention of my word "effortless", but just for extra-clarification. I did not mean that it was easy or lucky or if you shoot 400 shots, something will come out! type picture.But effortless, like the way a well choreographed ballet comes off. To me, this is the best kind of art. When I have a vague idea of some components. I put them loosely together and it takes a life of it's own. While I stay out of the way except to witness all the elements flowing together. And BTW, it was a dutch door, not a shower...but I guess that the viewer is always the boss, n'est pas?

That irregular septagon you photographed yourself behind was a Dutch Door, and I forgot, being left to my memories rather than the 'truth'.

 

And your comment that this photo's 'effortlessness' was like that of a well-choreographed ballet, is very high praise indeed.

 

And,although I may have taken 'effortless' as a pointof departure for commenting on the nature of such things, I never truly felt you felt otherwise.

 

But I would have taken 400 photos just to get one good one at this location -- it just reeks of 'gonna get at least something visually interesting' about it, don't you think?

 

I'm flattered by the attention you have given this photo; now I only wish I could see prints of the rest of the roll on which you shot yourself behind those Dutch doors. ;-)

 

John (Crosley)

'At last a good one for me'

 

Does that mean I've been disappointing you by posting 'bad' ones or 'mediocre' ones, and this finally broke the barrier?

 

Or do you mean that this one in particular appeals to your taste?

 

;-))

 

John (Crosley)

 

P.S. I just took a look at the ratings; I'm glad you really DO appreciate this.

 

I took one look on my digital screen and said 'this photo's got 'legs'.

 

JC

These last days I'm thirsty for "damn" good photos...mostly b/w street but something to say "aaaaah yeap...thats it!" Of course beauty is in the eye of the beholder but again the same ingredients THIS photo has, is in my most wanted photos as also, in my b/w section. Simplicity and good old time aesthetics :-)

 

For instance this one has nothing to do with the photo of the feet of an overweight lady. This btw must surely be viewed larger for better pleasure :-)

 

John you dont dissapoint me. :-)

 

You make me wait for something better until I see it! ;-))

 

p.s eliotterwitt.com indeed excellent I laughed with those jumping dogs and view of animals and people in space (bird with tap is another example)

Well, this photo has that in spades, Billy.

 

Unlike many of my photos, though it does not have a 'contrast' or a 'story'.

 

It is a pure display of geometry, which creates expectations, then a break in those expectations when we see the little girl's running/jumping figure right at the point where all those parallel (and converging due to a vanishing point) converge.

 

And they do so, roughly where a 'rule of thirds' analysis would place them, if one applied that rule on a 'landscape' level but not vertical -- instead horizontal --- left to right and/or vice versa. (Although also, possibly on a vertical scale too.)

 

So, this photo has a variety of mathematics to it, and although it might be difficult, each figure except the girl herself (her placement, yes) could be expressed by mathematical formulae.

 

There are lines, parallel lines and converging lines with a vanishing point and a rule of thirds placement which explains why the girl's placement feels so 'right'.

 

So, there you have it, simplicity of expression, though not necessarily of mathematics. A sort of 'golden rule' photograph, that would be hard NOT to score well, althogh raters had a good whack at it at first, probably because it had no 'story contradiction' or meat of a story at all.

 

It's all a nice, neat little package, self-contained, but in the end, without meaning -- just an expression of mathematical synchronicity, which translates into visual synchronicity.

 

And good just for that reason, I think.

 

In a way, it's a form of visual humor; the lines create the expectation that they'll go on unbroken.

 

The little girl's form, unexpectedly breaks those expectations.

 

Simple as that.

 

Photographic 'humor' without a particular 'joke'.

 

Get it?

 

John (Crosley)

Nice picture, no doubt. However, I wonder why you put your pictures on Request Critique, it seems you already have a view on them and just write most of the comments

There's one main way to get 'views' for one's photographs, and that is to put them up for critique request.

 

Although I have many views about my work, I am blessed by some of the most insightful critics a photographer could ever hope for; and many of the critiques and the colloquy that follows reveals depth to photos I did not know had such depth, or details I was unaware of or unknown associations.

 

I am very very grateful to those who critique my photos, and to each of them give special thanks; very, very few criticisms are far from the mark either.

 

And, on more than one occasion I have thought highly of a photo, only to have my views challenged; I welcome the challenge.

 

On the reverse, some photos I think are 'ordinary' may receive very high ratings and the critiques will reveal why; sometimes catching me quite by surprise.

 

I am a former writer and as a writer, I expected to be edited. That means not having such firm opinions one could not reason with me (as a writer).

 

I am much that way as a photographer; when my great critics bless me with an observation, I tend to acknowledge their contribution, as in developing my craft, these critiques have been 'like gold' to me.

 

Perhaps if you viewed the entirety of my work with the critiques that are attached, you'd see the wonderful symbiosis I have with so many highly-skilled critics -- some of whose critiques belong in a separate volume, they're so good.

 

Yes, I write a lot.

 

But I also listen to my critics and try to understand them; in return they have given me a graduate education in this craft.

 

That's why I post for critique.

 

If you find that exhausting, many who visit these pages don't; many newcomers to the service will read the critiques, compare them with the photos and my comments, just to learn the 'how' of photographing, because I tend to explain very thoroughly.

 

That is just for such people who make up the bulk of the viewership of these pages.

 

I often get compliments on my thorough explication (in the course of conversing with my critics) for one thing or another; and some of the older members have written me that they tend to read these critiques and my comments because they're 'interesting'. If you don't, then you are not obliged to read them at all.

 

But I take all criticism at face value, and thought you deserved more than a 'snappy' answer.

 

I hope you now have a deeper understanding of 'why'.

 

John (Crosley)

Ths girl reminds me (us) of an unspoken lesson that maybe illustrates the division between the ages.

 

For her, with her light weight and anxious legs, steps are made for running up.

 

For us older persons, steps are made for trudging up -- maybe after a long day -- step by step.

 

For teenagers, especially young men (as I remember being once) steps were for 'bounding up' often two or three steps at at time, as I as anxious to showcase my strength and my energy (as well as impatient to get where I was going.)

 

Hasn't it always been thus?

 

John (Crosley)

Great capture, John! It was worth the waiting.....

You mean I didn't post anything worth while for a long time and this is the first since whenever?

 

All kidding aside, this is a very fortuitous capture, as these steps will only photograph a child well, they're so small. I have been back many times and adults just cannot be captured on them, and this was my third shutter release.

 

I might just as well give up going back.

 

Thanks for your patience; I hope to reward my viewers with some regularity.

 

John (Crosley)