stefan1

This is a terrific shot, but I don't care for the toning. What is your intention behind it?

Thank you both.

Lárus: am I right to interpret your comment that you don't care for abstracts like this in the first place, or is it something about this one that particularly disagrees with you? I'm just really curious what reaction you have.

Tom: I see what you mean - I probably will go back and record some more of this phenomenon since I have just barely scratched the surface here. It was so rich that I actually got out the video camera instead when I first discovered this, follow the link for an idea of the range of possibilities. One problem here is that the pattern is so unstable that it is hard to get the exposure time from the faint light I get back from the setup I have currently, but that can be solved somehow. A short series, nicely printed will be nice - see what my tired old photoprinter can produce...

The red color here is pretty close to the light source I used, but it

may be off-putting to some. Is it sufficiently abstract not to make

you think of late night horror flicks?

I think it is a good idea to leave interpretation open ended here. I like the shadows under her jaw - not often you see that part of human anatomy this well :-)

Funny + I like the skin color you got here. Wondering if seeing some air under the arm would help?

This is a good capture of what was going on, but there are elements that make it a little confusing to process (for me at least). The white sheets distract my eye, the way the man is partially covered makes it a little hard to make out what is going on. Maybe cropping off some of the bottom would help? That would move her out of dead center as well.

I get a feeling of tilting to the left when I view this photo, and the trees to the right seem to support that notion. I think you need a subject besides the mountain to guide the eye and let it find a place to rest. Nice colors in the mountain. A little more detail in the white clouds might have been nice.

Is black/white the best format for these? The light is projected on a

black background and then inverted. Does this leave the glass more or

less intact in your perception?

It is a gorgeous portrait, but I would have extended the range towards more light tones. Maybe a little more headroom too.

I like color and composition. Are there digital tricks here? I don't see any evidence of it, but the geometry of the scene is a little hard to tease apart from all the different angles... Maybe crop out the bottom?

I think you'd be better off controlling the background and leaving it in than editing in an abstract which clashes with the (albeit twisted) reflection. Controlling DOF to blur it maybe. I'd like to see more segments (and whole ones) of the twister, plus horizontally straight would be nice...

Light/dark is handled really well. I would have liked to see a better correspondence in the expressions.

There is a blue cast as seen on the wall in the back, but the image is not manipulated in any way. The light cast on the faces are from candles being lit on a birthday cake in front of the two women.

I am a little ambivalent about the crowd too, but there are some practicalities here. This is a well trodden beach connecting some major hotels so it is hard not to have anybody there, and when you do, the footprints are still there!

Thanks all for the critique. It's back to the drawing board for this one :-)

That looks like very weak coffee. How unbecoming for an Italian! Applying electrodes to glass is also slightly offending to the physicist in me. Well lit, but the glare in the table to the right of the mat for the coffe might have been nice to get rid of.

The foreground looks like it has only a few shades of gray, same thing for parts of the sky. Is it the consequence of having to squeeze out contrast out of a shot with little dynamic range? Are the wisps clouds? These technicalities bring down the aesthetic value for me - it's a pity because I like the composition and the image as a B/W shot.

If anything, it looks like the water is flowing the other way! I like the mutet colors you have achieved here.

It is incredible that you managed to get them all to pay attention at the time you took the picture. They are all showing something different in their expressions.

This I like. It would be nice to know what was there to start with, and what you have done in editing.

Can you tell us what happened here: is this a straight photo of somebody else's artwork, or did you modify it yourself? Colors and effect feel a bit cheesy to me.

The funny title does not help you much here, on it's own the image does not evoke anything positive in me. Was the shot taken with a flash?

It is difficult to see what is going on with the dark background and the leaf-carrying ant having another ant in front of it. Closer up would be nice too.

It is original and well done, but the colors do not appeal to me. I understand that you need to have a transition towards the frame but something more consistent with the center might have been better.

The blue cast might be a mismatched film/light condition, but it could work to make a interesting image if you could exaggerate it somehow to look more like clinical lab-light.