Jump to content

Mark Z

Members
  • Posts

    1,462
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by Mark Z

  1. When I bring up your profile page it lists 77 photos as being Featured, but when I click on the Featured icon I can see only 17 of them (and the Featured section lists the count as 17). Your total Photos is listed as 48, and I can see them all. As I scroll through Galleries, I see 13 galleries and they list a total of 47 photos. I can see the Moroccan Dunes photo (which I'm assuming is the one you just uploaded) in all three sections (Featured, Photos, and Galleries). As for Trending photos, I see Moroccan Dunes on the last page, but none of your other shots. I assume there is a time limit for Trending photos - maybe "stale" photos that were uploaded more than 30 days ago are removed from Trending. Hope this helps. I'm using a Windows 10 laptop with the latest Firefox.
  2. Mark Z

  3. Steve, it really isn't possible to see detail on Mars with your lens. What you're getting are out of focus images of what is nearly a point source, and "details" are most likely atmospheric effects. With Mars being rather low in the sky for you, these effects are worsened - you are looking through at least three air masses (three times the amount of air compared to looking straight up) when you look at Mars. People who are getting nice images of Mars, including surface details, are using longer focal lengths and image stacking (often thousands of images) to wring out details. See the Solar System Imaging and Processing forum on Cloudy Nights. Cloudy Nights Forums
  4. The Sunny 16 rule applies to terrestrial scenes, and it needs to be adjusted for something like Mars, which is farther from the light source (the Sun) than the Earth. Mars receives a little less than half the sunlight as does Earth. In addition, the light from Mars needs to pass through our entire atmosphere, which scatters and absorbs light, further diminishing its brightness. For a photo of Mars, Sunny 16 may need to be modified to Sunny 9.5 or even Sunny 8.
  5. Mark Z

    Drew, Plane/s

    It's deceiving in its simplicity. Very striking.
  6. Granted, Mars is near opposition and appears bigger than it usually does, but it's still mighty small at only 24 arcseconds. With a 105 mm lens, it would make an image about 12 micrometers across, or about 3 pixels on the D7100 sensor. Being orange, it should also show some color. In Minnesota, Mars is only going to get 20 degrees or so above the southern horizon, so there may be some atmospheric degradation of the image. I suspect we are seeing either a focusing problem, or an object that is not Mars.
  7. Mark Z

    Winter Quarters

    It's like a sleepy eyelid closing on an autumnal scene, getting ready for winter's hibernation.
  8. Mark Z

    Nara Gas Station

    Without the bottom quarter or so, this would be much more abstract, a collage of shapes and primary colors. But the bottom of the photo brings us back to the reality of concrete, sewers, tires, asphalt. I like that division between the vivid, dynamic shapes, and the gray dullness of the paved urban environment.
  9. Mark Z

    I love the Penrose tiling, and I'm glad to see it being used in architecture. I toyed with the idea of tiling a bathroom like this, but because tile shops don't sell Penrose tiles, I would have had to cut them all myself, so it remains a pipe dream. Showing just part of the building and the advertising adds to the abstraction. Excellent work. The spire on the right just looks impossibly tall and narrow. I'd like to visit this place someday. In the meantime, I'm enjoying your virtual tour, Drew.
  10. Mark Z

    Whole Foods

    Just to be clear, I'm sure Jack's photo complies with PN's Terms, and here in the States it would be "fair use" under copyright laws. I see no problem there. There is obviously no claim by Jack that he made the woodcut, and there is no commercial use, nor harm to the artist. The question I asked in my first post is one I've found intriguing for years, and seeing Jack's photo just brought it up in my mind again. It was a somewhat tangential thought. Holger, I think that sculptures in public places can be great photographic subjects. I take photos of them with zero guilt, because like you, I'm not claiming I made the sculpture, nor is my purpose commercial in any way.
  11. Mark Z

    Pegasus

    Drew, many thanks for your comment here, and for all your recent comments on my photos. I appreciate them very much.
  12. To me this is a somewhat humorous depiction of the "tunnel and light" experience some people have reported during a near-death experience. Instead of a tunnel, here is a hallway, and the bright light comes from the kitchen. The funny part is that instead of floating peacefully down the tunnel toward the warm and all-encompassing light, your brother has turned his back on it to get in one last putt. A sort of parting shot, a shot directed at you. I really like this photo, Jack.
  13. Mark Z

    Road Kill

    I can't stop looking at this; it must be my morbid curiosity at work. I love the impression that the tire left as it rolled across this plastic-skinned thing, wringing liquid from its guts. It is beautiful to behold. It's plastic caught between concrete and vulcanized rubber. The dynamics of the pressing tire, the bulging of the plastic, application of irresistible force, the rupture and the vomiting forth of the innards, and the slow trickle of liquid toward the crack in the pavement can all be visualized in this one shot of the aftermath. It makes me glad that we have dominion over the earth and all the animals.
  14. Mark Z

    London has some interesting architecture. You have a cheese grater and a gherkin next to buildings that look centuries old. I wonder if the various architectural styles need a while to get to know each other. The couple on the bench seem to have eyes for each other, yet their body language is still reserved and tentative. They have kept an arm rest between them. Their hands and feet seem like they want to touch, but are holding back. The guy's foot on the ground strikes a bashful pose. I think it must be love, and I'm as curious as the two pigeons about how this scene will progress. It looks like the guy has finished his ice cream, while the lady still has a scoop. What can be read into that?
  15. You've lined up the wheels of the bike perfectly with the horse's hooves, so it looks like the horse could roll around easily. A Trojan carousel horse?
  16. Mark Z

    Whole Foods

    Michael, you said that this photo isn't typical of Jack's work. I see it as near one end of a spectrum of his work that incorporates "art" by others. Some of Jack's recent work has walls of graffiti, posters, and other applied or stenciled images or signs. Most of the time he shows multiple things, but here he's concentrating on just one piece of art, so that's one kind of spectrum he's operating with. Another spectrum of his has endpoints of purely random or found objects, and at the other end is intentionally made art. I think that while much of Jack's work tends to be on the "found" half of that spectrum, here he's moving the slider way over to the intentional side by framing a single complete work of art. It would be interesting to know if the person who posted the crocodile is also the artist, or if the poster was leaving a kind of calling card, too.
  17. Mark Z

    The pod is an unexpected feature in what looks like an aerial photo. It looks like it's floating. It reminds me of Solkosky's photos of a fashion model in a bubble.
  18. Your framing of the scene makes it look like a stage production, with the curtain across the top and the apron of the stage in the foreground. Kudos.
  19. Mark Z

    He seems to be adrift, and his pose suggests that he's about ready to give up on a rescue. Nice shot, and I like your desaturated treatment.
  20. Mark Z

    Whole Foods

    Jack, I like the idea of photos being like calling cards, things to let others know what you find interesting. Maybe that is one thing that makes posting photos on social media popular. The internet certainly offers more exposure for one's photos than in the old days when snapshots got circulated only to a circle of friends. It's been very useful to me to be able to peruse so many portfolios from people physically far from me. In my early decades it would have been fantasy to think of sharing photos with people around the globe, and regularly connecting with someone in Osaka.
  21. Mark Z

    Whole Foods

    Jack, something that struck me when I saw this photo in the Critique lineup was its juxtaposition with Wayne Melia's photo. /photo/18486576/Partially-Hidden. Coincidence or not, I don't know, but the similar look was curious. I think your photo brings up the question of whose art is this? I'm assuming the alligator woodcut is something you found, and not your creation. If that's the case, then someone else made the artwork and selected the white wall on which it's posted. You decided how much of the wall to include as a "mat", and you composed and snapped the photo, and you put a frame around it, and changed it from a woodcut to a photograph. I'd consider you a co-creator. But it makes me wonder where the line is. At what point does taking a picture of a picture (or a woodcut or a painting) cross the line into plagiarism or copyright infringement? This isn't a critique of your photo, so such a question belongs in the Philosophy forum, I know. But it is one thought that was triggered in me when I saw your photo.
  22. In the video it's brought up several times how hard it is to grasp how big the universe is, and how citing the diameter in light years is almost useless in helping us visualize its size. Then it's claimed that the image from Hubble helps us visualize the immensity. I don't buy it. There is no good way to describe what the deep field shows that makes me understand the size of the universe any better than previous photos of galaxies. Whether a galaxy is a zettameter away, or a yottameter away, there is no way to really visualize the difference. I have seen stars that are ten thousand light years away, and I've looked through a telescope at a quasar that is two billion light years away. I can't truly visualize either of these distances, even though I've seen these objects with my eyes. The Hubble deep field image is technically amazing, and scientifically important, and I do not intend to detract from that. But to claim that we can visualize the size of the universe when we look at the image is bogus. To say that it's the single most important image ever taken is just melodrama.
×
×
  • Create New...