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action reportage


luigirota

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Wedding

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Congrats Luigi! Astonishing shot in terms of timing, dynamics and, of course, subject!! IMHO this shot is a great POW! Ciao. Daniele

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Nice to have a wedding pic as a subject matter.

Great rare photo opportunity. I wonder if the picture have clarity if the subjects were composed so that it is isolated from the background helicopter/helicopter pilot. As it stands now the composition is a bit muddled. My2cents.

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It's a powerful, dramatic photograph because of the spectacular scene of the newlyweds rushing to a waiting helicopter ahead of them in this mountainious setting. In my opinion the composition of the photograph is extravagant in the sense that extraneous elements have been allowed to in a sense impinge on the spectacle: the cloud mass top left and even the clouds top right, the mountains. The fringe of cloud at the top rim of the frame should definitely have been cropped out. The delicate clouds further ahead of the helicopter serve the composition the best. My suggestion would be to crop this image drastically: crop on the left till where the rock mid-left starts to become almost horizontal, crop on the right till you leave just a fringe of the second layer of cloud (from the top) at right, crop from top till the central point of the frame becomes approximately the place on the woman's body where the gown starts to flounce out from her mid-riff.

My congratulations to Luigi Rota on taking this stunning shot in circumstances which I'm sure will not have been ideal, with the wind and the crucial matter of timing -- which perhaps is the key to the capture of this spectacular scene. He must have had to take split-second decisions in this harrowing situation. And in the matter of timing he has succeeded totally. A second earlier or later and they would have blocked the view of the helicopter.

I will try to upload this suggested crop...

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What an amazing picture! (Too bad all weddings can't turn out this way) You rarely see an image with so many lines all leading directly to the center of attention. Even the grass is pointing inward! Rajat's crop diminishes that somewhat by trimming some of those lines, but it emphasizes the urgency of the situation. I think the wedding couple is a little incongruous; the scene would be more common if the couple were perhaps soldiers instead. But that incongruity is part of what makes it so good! If the scene were sketched without any clue as to the nature of the couple, we might have expected a depiction of a refugee evacuation.

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Powerful shot & technically well done. I think I'd crop a bit off the right side. Love the timing & the tones are very well done. Good to see a PJ shot as POW. Congrats

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Finally! Something interesting in the genre of wedding photography. In black and white, no less! Bravo!

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All the elements work so well together to produce an image that is both dynamic and timeless, a worthy POW. I totally understand the aesthetic issues pointed out by the others, the clutter, the lack of clarity, but these problems are often inherent in street photography, and contribute to their quirky charm. If I have one small problem, it is that the contrast range is a tad too broad, and color may have been a better medium to soften the journey from the intense white of the lady's dress and the coal black of the man's suit, but this is the photographer's choice, and we have to, all things considered, accept his vision as he presents it.

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In my opinion color would have grabbed attention away from the spectacle itself, diffused the impact. Not knowing the antecedents of the image would have only added mystery and in a sense heightened the tension.

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The black and white treatment is part of the strength of this image, the crisp tones  and the wide tonal range are a beauty to look at. I think the extremity of the dark black pants and suit tails work well to contrast the white dress. The sharpness and clarity is admirable particularly in an action shot such as this.
While there is a lot going on in the center of the shot I do not find it congested or confusing which in large part is due to the excellent separation of the individual elements afforded by the back-lighting and the careful use of dof.
 
I like the way in which the chopper blade follows the skyline line against the distant horizon. The opposite travel of the line of the foreground hill sets up a nice arrangement of complimentary triangular shapes composed of the sky , mid section valley and forefront slope. I do wish the subjects were a bit less bulls-eyed. I also find the branches and the bright white clouds on the upper left frame edge a distraction, without adding anything to the scene. Although I find Rajat's crop too tight and it does not address the centering of the subject, it does remove the cluttered upper left corner.

I would suggest an alternate crop.

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Like Gordon I too do not find the center congested/confusing. There is adequately good separation of the woman, man and helicopter. However I go with my crop (just my opinion, it is Luigi's prerogative of course). This is an action shot with a spectacular scene at is core. As Doug points out the tighter crop "emphasizes the urgency of the situation". As Gordon has said there is "a nice arrangement of complimentary triangular shapes composed of the sky , mid section valley and forefront slope." But I suggest these triangles are better served in the tighter cropped image than in Gordon's crop suggestion. Look at the sky and the area demarcated by the helicopter blades in both cropped versions. In the former a clear triangle is evident, in the latter it is four sided. My crop suggestion considered centering of the subject (along with other compositional considerations like balance, impact, etc -- no point in repeating myself). I chose to center it on the woman's midriff, Gordon seems to have centered on the shoulders and head of the man. The woman is the brightest element in the scene, the man the darkest. Centering on the woman's midriff yields me several advantages -- it felicitiously balances out everything in the composition that I feel important. Look at the rim of the mountain on which the action is happening. In the first image we have equal distance from the perimeter of central action. In the latter not. In the second image the rim on the right is double what it is on the left. About the same argument holds for the ends of the blades.


I trust this does not appear as a diatribe against Gordon's version. A healthy debate is my only desire, a fine way to learn when done civilly.

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Well, they sure had a spectacular start and you were there to witness it. B&W was a good choice and good job overall. Congrats.

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Rajat;
 
In my opinion, healthy debate is a significant part of the enjoyment of commenting on the POW, so please feel free to disagree with any opinions I may put forth.
I was not looking at the framing in terms of which figure  was centered in the frame nor which piece of anatomy fell to the middle, so yours is an interesting illumination and insight. I tend to see the subject collectively as the bride, groom and chopper. My crop moves that collective subject off center to the left which I feel gives better balance.  I like your crop and see the wisdom of your choices. For my tastes, the issue is that the tighter crop further undermines the sense of vastness and open space in the original. If that one bright cloud and those branches were not intruding, I would have suggested and even wider crop or possibly none at all.

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Thank you for your understanding, Gordon. I was expecting no less from you, given my interaction with you in the recent past.
In light of your comments I've re-looked at the original image. Actually Luigi's composition is best so far as the sense of vastness goes. And the illustration of vastness can add value to the spectacle. Post-processing could easily get rid of the offending clouds/branches and lighten up the dark rocks center-left and center-right. Then perhaps a 5:3 widescreen ratio would be ideal. Like the crop of the orignal I'm uploading now...

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