john_h.1

Everything is rather bright considering the backlighting.

See! Great photos can be made without photoshopping in birds flying accross the horizon.

Sorry but a 7/7 for this image is ridiculus. Its just a picture of a building with a huge dark shadow on it. Its one composition highlight is the top structure placed in the middle of a singular cloud formation. Its not enough to propel the image to the top of the heap in all catagories. There are superior images in the gallery but this is not one of them.

Those birds sure must be "tired" as you say considering how long they hovered for you in exactly the right spot while your shutter remained open for the water effects.

"absolutely incredible capture!"

 

Its inevitable. Whenever a picture, with a bird frozen and ever so perfectly juxtoposed on a rule of thirds axis, is presented, comes the "capture" comment. Usually it "a great capture". In this case its an absolutely incredible one.

 

Its a very nice picture but, under these lighting conditions, the bird was not captured frozen like this. In other word's, its a fake. This isn't to say people should not enjoy the image. If you do, great, more power to you, but please, its not a "capture".

 

 

Yes, it is over the top. Adding things for the sake of adding things doen't create a mood. Adding a rainbow to a picture is not a very good example of creativity, it is just, well, adding a rainbow to a picture.

 

Other pictures in the portfolio have more impact. The Morning Guardian appears to be enhaced with Photoshop but, either way, it is striking at first glance.

 

The stop sign with the moving blur of a yellow truck is a good example of contradiction, color and even story. For whatever reason, the contradiction of a rainbow doesn't really work. Its just a rainbow on a sunny day. The truck is moving, while something else says stop. There's also the consequence of not stopping and encountering a big truck. Its got the colors. It works because it has a reason and overall artistic elements and composition. No one looks at that picture and thinks you put a sign or bus in it with photoshop just to put them there.

 

Keep em' coming!

A powerful image was captured here but I also have to agree with some others about the color tone added to it. Puke greeen mixed with gold? Ughh! Why does a great presentation need such a hideous tint?

Sometimes the built in flash works good.

The most powerful image in your portfolio! This gives us action and tells us a story with a little bit left to the imagination. Its not the same ole' landscape. It is an interesting use of the otherwise cliche moving water blur effect. This image should be even higher in the rankings.

I can't see giving the image a 7 for originality as this same shot has made the rounds so often. I don't recall if the location of the sun at the opposite part of the day would help fill in the dark shadow on half the building. If so, I would also diagree with the 7 for asthetics. I'm not trying to put down the image, I would rate it high anyway.

"I'd like to see it a bit brighter."

 

As in photoshopped to death? Its about as far as it can go before the image starts to be ruined. Its best as is.

 

One of many nice scenes on the way to the Adirondack Loj.

The location listed in the details is wrong. This was taken near Saranac Lake in the Adirondaks.

Starting the day at Mt. Pisgah

"Another moonlit night that draws one's attention. Beautiful."

 

Beautiful. perhaps, but a moonlit night doesn't exist when the clouds are in the way.

 

A perfect 10.

"Only thing that bothers me is the formation of clouds, too symmetric to be real."

 

The CLOUDS are too unreal? Um, what about that bird?

Let me guess, Draganizer?

"John, with all due respect, How the heck do you know how the photographer saw the scene?"

 

Do you know of any instances where a human being has something wrong with their vision such that their eyes see thing compressed together? If you can cite such an occurance then perhaps I may be wrong but even then it will be extrodinarily unlikely to have occured in this case. That's how the heck I know.

"Nobody has ever dared accusing Monet, Picasso or Cezanne of manipulating paintings of south of France because they didn�t reproduce reality, but the way the artist saw it."

 

This does not address the concerns raised. The photographer did not see the dunes the way they were presented as is suggested above. Moreover, the issue is not that the image is manipulated. The issue is how it is presented. It is presented in a frame with a title that suggests it is based on reality when it is not. Its that simple.

I guess some people like overly processed images with faked backgrounds. The positioning of the birds is cool. I would like to see them in another context.

Many comment about there being a perfect capture here or words to that effect. It is an excellent picture but it is obvious that the tonal range presented was not captured. It was enhanced later. Perhaps one might say the the essence of the scene was 'captured' in the final image. It is an unlikely intent. We often see images where something is added to an image. Usually its a flying bird placed ever so perfectly along a rule of thirds crosspoint. Then comes the comments about the great capture even though it ought to be obvious that the image was not captured but, in fact, manufactured.

 

Some slack may be given to the tonal enhancements. Afterall, enhancements have been made in the darkroom from the beginning. We have been accustomed to seeing pictures that do not have the range of the human eye. When we see an image that does, it looks fake even though it is probably closer to what the human eye of the photograher saw. An irony indeed.

 

This image does not seem to be what the human eye would see however. Its enhancement went even beyond making up for the loss of range seen by film or a sensor. It is a very pleasing image though. But it is not a perfect "capture", at least not for its range. Maybe for its composition.

 

At least there is no fake bird flying across the scene

Just had to throw that bird in there eh?

Download the Draganizer action and, poof!! Compliments for your unique artistry abound.

This was at an unremarkable beach location. The only thing around

was the big driftwood. Only up close were the faces revealed. Thanks

to whoever carved them. This shot would have failed but for a SB-600

flash eliminating a harsh shadow on the left face.