chandos_michael_brown

The effect is subtle, but it improves the image. Many thanks for the suggestion.

Chandos

I think that you've created an utterly banal portrait and that you ought to learn to look a little more closely at images before you presume to crop them. I find the black border especially obnoxious. If I'd wanted one, then I sure as hell know how to create one.

Comments I am always happy to receive; save ham-handed crops for your own work.

Mr. Miller presents the first of this year's crop of "Incredible,"

Rochester, Indiana, August, 2003.

Thanks for the comments. I don't wish to argue with them, but perhaps to clarify a couple of things that are clearly not evident enough. First, truth in advertising: I made this with a Contax G2, not a Leica--as indicated in the note. I no longer have the G2, so I had to give photo.net something for its various 'boxes.' I use Leicas exlusively now.

More important, though, "Helen" is inseparable as a person from those "antiquey" things in the cabinet behind and elsewhere and, to the extent that I could, I wished to include these in an 'environmental' portrait. Had I to do it again, though, I'd use either a 35 or a 28 mm lens and get in very close (a largish table separates us in this photo). Second, I exposed this image at something like 1/25 at f2.8, which is to say that I couldn't have gotten it at all with a slower emulsion without resorting either to fill flash (ugh!) or a tripod (equal ugh!).

I do not want to give the impression that your points aren't well taken. I deeply appreciate your response.

Chandos

Dawn on the Chesapeake Bay, Schooner Leopard, en route from Baltimore

to Norfolk.