Awaiting spring

Beautiful and meaningful in its simplicity. Regards, Alfredo

Thanks, Alfredo. Winter is long where I live and I wanted our old chair to express my desire for spring.

Simple and strong image. I love the title too, even though this summer we had less sun than in the winter :(

Daniel, I guess that if the chair knew that summer in Eastern Canada would be so wet, it may have preferred to stay in winter longer. Taken in the lake district, late winter, near Peterborough, Ontario, at a rental cottage. The old chair (prop) hails from Quebec City, where we too, like you in Montreal, are raising our umbrellas as much as our cameras these summer days.

good picture Arthur

Saw it lately in the long forum thread you have started, and came to find it here.I like the composition, the play of light and shadow, at first moment it looked like the chair is standing on two legs....;-)) because the shadow is so strong. just a chair,but a very good composition.

 

BTW, the thread is interesting, I try to follow it ( with 2 dictionaries.. because of language barrier), But I will say that the frame form( like a square) must be compatible to the content of the subject photographed.

(I have read your bio as well,I love photography, and the creating arts, Nice to read you.)

Hi, Pnina,

 

Thanks for your appreciation. I may have lost a little tonality in the B&W conversion from color, but I had been shooting infrared B&W film elsewhere and wanted to ge a bit of that stark IR look to emphasize the simple geometrical elements. I should probably try to re-convert it with more control over the highlights and shadows, but accepting a more even tonality might take away a bit in this image.

 

I wish that my ability in my second language (that of my wife) would be as good as your command of English. It is great to read the ideas of others like yourself on Photo.Net forums. I for one have learned a lot.

Thanks for your encouragement of my English, that I'm not very happy with...I feel I need a lot more, I still have difficulties... but it is really very kind of you.

 

I think we don't stop learning....

 

I like this photo of yours as is, tonality looks very nice on my screen.

 

 

Part of a series on old chairs from our local community. Staged composition, by

placing the chair on the dock as the ice was starting to melt from the lake.

PDE

Simple, strong, meaningful, I absolutely love the shot - makes me think of fisherman waiting for first signs of melting ice to wet their line (ok I am obviously a fisherman :)]

Pierre, Elery

 

Thank you for your appreciation. It was a staged shot, as I was looking for ways to incorporate the chair into the surroundings. I found that the lake thaws by first turning a black color (a few weeks on, or more) and only then are the fish easily chased.

Arthur, I saw this one as a thumbnail under a thread, and for sure it is eye-catching.

Part of the eye-catchingness is the simplicity, but what begged me to look a second time is the question whether it's all so simple. Sure, as a composition it's strong, and made of relatively basic elements; in that sense it's simple. But on second study....what am I looking at? Or, what's the chair looking at?

I love the near surreal texture of the sea. The 'direction of the chair' invites both in, and locks out. It feels lonely mostly, with an empty barren world around it. The image intrigues and leaves me wondering more than a bit.

Which is a long way of saying I like this image quite a lot!

Wouter,

 

Thank you for giving your impressions of the image. I almost regret putting a title on it, as unless you have lakes around you and a long cold winter as we Canadians have, the wait for spring is not long and not a slow process. Despite the sunny and fairly warm day here, it will take many weeks before the ice leaves the lake.

 

More to read in the image.  I like that observation. The ice doesn't really look like ice and the slight infrared like effect does give a bit of a surrealist impression as you say. Perhaps the chair and the empty looking horizon is a metaphor for the photographer, who tries to understand his world or environment, but often comes up short or who faces unanswered questions.

 

Thanks for making me think more about the photo.  

Ooops. Wouter, first paragraph, please remove "not" from not long and not a slow process. My error. Arthur

I had no trouble recognizing this as ice (I grew up in eastern Montana), and that immediately made the chair stand out, because almost no one would choose to sit here for long.  The ice and chair also gave life or meaning to your title.  I wasn't led by your title; it just told me that you and I reacted to the photograph in similar ways.

Stephen, it seems like in the throes of winter but it was actually quite warm there in what was really very early spring (April 2), and sitting out in the sun not at all too painful. Within about a week the ice will turn black before suddenly melting, signalling the proximity of the water below it. Some darkness was already occuring here in the ice towards the centre of the lake.

 

But you did catch me out, in the sense that the chair was not indigenous to this wharf, being one of two chair props that I had been travelling with and using in some of my photographic scenes. Minnesota and certain parts of southern Canada have probably a lot in common and I appreciate your ready recognition of the atmosphere generated by the image. This was shot in colour and I am still having difficulty in getting the B&W tonality that I would like and that I would get with B&W film and yellow or orange flltering. 

:--]] !