brad_hiltbrand

Very graphic! I like the simplicityt of this shot. Great image.

A poor translation of the above comment:

 

and you say me that my ftos are boring, laughter gives when seeing yours me, the light it is of the worse thing, the sky this totally burned, the snow without detail, learns to describe a photo, first time who I see that somebody says that a photo is boring, gives laughter me

 

 

Explanation: I decided to honestly rate this guys 5 very aveerage photos on the top page. I called a couple of them 'boring'. He responds this way. All I can say about this shot is that is it is not perfect by any means. But Saul seems used to superlative ratings only. Whatever.

This one is pretty good but the bright foreground on the right seems artificially lit. 5/4

I see spectacular light in a slightly out of focus image. Color is very odd and does not strike me as natural. This is an average snapshot of an obviously beautiful scene. An opportunity missed.

I found this sculptural arrangement of red and black pumice stone near the

700-foot tall Eureka Dune in northern Death Valley NP last Winter. I think this

is a recent attempt by some modern human to leave a mark on the place and

not something created long ago by Native Americans, but I found it interesting

and difficult to photograph well. This image places the sculpture in context on

the dry lake bed that surrounds the enormous dune at the South end of

Eureka Valley. I suspect that if it is of recent origin the Park rangers have

probably already destroyed this formation. Does it have any meaning for you?

Crater Lake just before sunrise. I was really shooting another view of the lake

when I turned and saw these incredible colors on the lake reflecting the pre-

dawn light on the overcast sky. There was a combination of smoke from

several nearby lightning-set fires, thundercloud remnants, and high humidity

on the lake. I love the color on this shot and the tree silhouettes in the lower

left, but I am not sure the composition works. Constructive comments are

welcome.

This shot emphasizes the wonderful clouds over Crater Lake Oregon on a

mid-August afternoon. I underexposed a little to emphasize the sky which

resulted in Wizard island going almost completely black. This may have been

a case for a ND grad filter but since I use a rangefinder that option is out. I like

this shot even though it records only about 5 stops of an 8 stop scene.

I had the opportunity to spend a weekend at Crater Lake Oregon recently, and

even though it was mid-August there were strong thunderstorms each

evening that produced 10 small fires from lightning strikes nearby. The

smoke, combined with high humidity over the lake, made for somewhat hazy

conditions at sunrise. On this morning, the sun appeared briefly and then

disappeared into the clouds rising high enough to cast this golden torch

across the lake. This is one of my favorites from that weekend. I hope

someone likes it.

This is a detail shot of a bristlecone pine shortly before dawn. There are no

clouds that mornings to make an interesting sky to the West, but I hope the

wonderful texture and color of the aged wood is enough. The snow-capped

peaks of the Eastern Sierra Nevada range only 12 miles away across the

Owens Valley can just barely be seen in the lower left of the image. Does this

image work, or is it too busy?

That is exactly what I thought when I turned and saw the light on this tree. This image has not been manipulated in any way except as noted above, and those adjustments were a poor attempt to produce a small jpg image that approximates the original slide. The slide is much more magical than this jpg.

 

I was blessed with wonderful light for about 20 minutes on one evening during a 5 day trip. I just wish this jpg has the luminescence and glow on the tree that I see on my light table.

I recently spent several days at Grandview campground in the White

Mountains and spent my days seeking great light. There never was a

shortage of interesting subjects, but the harsh light at over 11,000 feet made

for tough photographic conditions, even at sunrise and sunset. On one

evening, a light overcast had developed by late afternoon and by sunset the

trees were bathed in golden light and the sky was not a boring expanse of

blue. This photograph does not really reflect the wonderful light I saw that

evening, but it comes close. Do you like it?

Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest. White Mountains California. Elevation over

11,000

 

This remote location is home to the oldest living trees on Earth. Some have

been dated at almost 5000 years old. I do not know the age of this tree,

although it is obviously very old. It has likely seen more than a million sunsets.

I hope this photograph reflects the timeless beauty and magnificence of these

trees.

I was at the racetrack dawn to dusk on the 4th of January and kept trying to figure out how to best photograph the grandstand rocks against the playa. I failed miserably. Your image is simply wonderful. I am sure the moon was really there, it was rising after dusk earlier in the week, so this image makes sense. I do think a little PS touch-ups to tone down the sky and enhance the appearence of the moon would help this shot a great deal.

 

Nice job. A "wish I had taken that" shot. Congratulations.

This is a resubmission of an earlier version of this image. At the

suggestion of fellow PNetters, I have done some dodging and

burning and used a gradiated brightness filter to tone down a

light sky. I think this image is a little better than the previous

version. What do you think?

This is an early morning shot from Zabriskie Point in the Black

Mountains looking West at the snow-covered Panamint

mountains on the far side of Death Valley. Comments?

Wind driven patterns in the sand at Eureka Dune, Death Valley,

CA. It is hard to see on a computer monitor at low resolution, but

there are tracks on lower left and center from a desert kangaroo

rat investigating those two small twigs blown onto the sand. This

is a color image of a monochromatic subject taken just before

dawn.

A quick hand-held detail shot of one of the enormous wheels on

a 20-mule team ore cart, the semi-tractor trailers of the late

1800's. I like the way the red paint on the wheel contrasts with

the grey of the old cart. I like the way this shot turned out.

Comments?

This photo was taken just after the 'sweet' light of dawn, after the

sun had risen high enough to brightly light just the tops of the

hills on the right. Several other photographers had already

packed up, but I like this frame the best of the mornings shots.

What do you think of it?

A carved angel on the end of a marble bench near the

mausoleum of William Huntington in the Huntington Gardens,

San Marino CA. Although I had to shoot this just past mid-day,

I'm pleased with the monochrome tonality of this image. There is

just a hint of color although color was not manipulated in PS. Do

you like it, or not?

This is an amazing lion-footed angel carving on a bench near the

mausoleum of William Huntington in the Huntington Gardens,

San Marino CA. I like the monochrome result of this exposure a

mid-day. No color manipulations in PS. Does anybody else like

this image?

Colors changed rapidly as the sun rose higher moving the

shadow line down the mountains. It is hard to judge the best

time to photograph this lake because it does not recieve light in

the until at least an hour past sunrise proper. This image takes

in the whole length of the lake from the dam and includes the

blue reflection from the sky in the water around the rock in the

foreground. I was lucky to be there at a time with wonderful fall

colors.Comments on this image? Is it better or worse than the

zoomed-in version posted earlier?

I could not avoid the fishing boats this morning at Lake Sabrina

near Bishop in the Eastern Sierra Nevada mountains, but this

shot incorporates a boat in a way that I think helps this image by

providing a sense of scale. Comments? Suggestions?

Some of the comments on this thread regarding the originality of

this image betray a sort of photographic ennui. The demand for

original landscapes is something like demanding that

landscape photographers ignore the well-known landmarks, or

at least continually seek out a vantage point to photograph from

that no potential reviewer has ever seen represented before. It is

silly.

 

There are good reasons that this view of Mesa Arch is familiar

besides the fact that it is easy to get to. It is a stunning,

absolutely marvelous, wonderous scene of natural beauty. While

I appreciate the desire to see something new in every

photograph, there is nothing inherently wrong with making a

photograph from a 'familiar' location. Each photograph should

stand on its own merits. Exact reproduction of a famous

landscape photograph will prove to be very difficult if not

impossible. Overemphasis on this fuzzy, ill-defined notion of

'originality' detracts from a wonderful display of the photographic

art.

 

As someone who has recently been seriously chasing the light

in 'familiar' landscape locations, I can attest to the difficulty of

producing great photographs of 'familiar' and 'unoriginal'

locations. Despite maybe 20 different trips to the Golden Gate

Bridge, I have yet to produce a photograph that leaves me

satisfied: the light was wrong, the sky boring, the shadows to

dark, I chose a weak composition, sshould have chosen another

time of day, another time of year, etc.

 

I have never made an image of Yosemite valley from the tunnel

view that even comes close to the beauty of Ansel Adam's

'copies' of the work of still earlier photographers. That will not

stop me from photographing from the tunnel view from

time-to-time. Making a great image there requires a lot more

than pre-existing tripod holes. It takes luck, weather, planning,

knowledge, and skill. Most photographs of the tunnel view are

boring not because the location is familiar, but because most

are simply poor photographs. The quality of the photograph is

not pre-determined by the location.

 

I try to find new perspectives from which to photograph, but often

the traditional spots seem to have the best aesthetic potential.

But it is POTENTIAL only. Making a great photograph at a

'familiar' location is a lot harder that it seems. Morey's views of

Mesa Arch are familiar, but still unique. No one else has made a

photograph identical in every respect to any of Morey's Mesa Arch

photos.

 

This charge of unoriginality of this photograph, or many other

landscape photographs of familiar locations, is wrong. I think

Doug Burgess' suggestion is a good one. Ask twenty

photographers to photograph the same famous scene from the

same location and we will end up with twenty unique

photographs. Landscapes are always unique and taking great

ones requires lots of hard work, dedication, knowledge, and

vision. Morey displays all those characteristics with all the

photos in his folders. Thanks for sharing Morey!

This is reworked version of an earlier submission. This image

needed some careful work on selective brightness, color levels,

and contrast in selective areas to try and tame some of the

enormous brightness range. This is my best result so far.

 

There was a great deal of smoke in the air driving over the 9600'

Sonora Pass in the late afternoon from nearby forest fires. At

higher elevations the aspens were changing color and the

smoke made the light somewhat soft and interesting. I took this

shot because I was intrigued by the bright light on the hill side in

the upper middle of the frame. The most interesting aspect of the

image to me is the subtle play of soft light in the smoke around

the dark trees of the forest, and the many receding layers of

terrain. Because I was shooting into the sun, there is an extreme

contrast range, the sky was blown out, but it was already white

from the smoke. I am pleased with the 'painterly' feel of this

photograph. Anybody else like it?

This is wonderful! Seeing the small thumbnail, I thought this was some sort of strange digital alteration putting a cloud on the ground, but the larger image set me straight. It captures an interesting moment. I give it high marks for originality, but aesthetically it is not as pleasing.