craigd

I think the result is probably exactly what the photographer wanted. It is rather pictorialist, which no doubt will earn it some criticism from people who can't stand that sort of thing -- I remember some comments on past POTWs complaining about "pictorialist rubbish", for example.

The composition fits nicely into the almost-square frame. The graphic design elements (mostly triangles) are strong and well-placed. The B&W treatment is well done, though I'm not crazy about the slightly greenish tinting -- I would have preferred either a standard sepia tone or no tinting at all. There are bright lines that look like halos from over-sharpening along the top of the thigh and the upper back. I find those just a little distracting.

My only real problem with this image is that in concept it isn't particularly original. It's like one of those songs that seems too familiar the first time you hear it, but you aren't quite sure what other song it reminds you of. Sometimes people manage to get hit songs that way, because they're pushing the right buttons to appeal to the masses, but those songs don't usually go on to become classics because they're just not distinctive enough.

One more thought: Is this dog really an ovcharka? He doesn't look much like one, to judge from other pictures I found in a quick Google search. But I'm not a dog breed expert, and it could be that the angle of the shot gives a misleading impression of the shape of the head and ears.

It's cute and nicely done. I like the colors, the way the yellow-gold-orange background interacts with the dog's cream and brown tones. I like the way it's basically a symmetrical composition without the symmetry being too perfect. But it's ultimately a pretty empty image. If the photographer could apply his obvious skill to something more meaningful, he might have something.

The picture is obviously posed, but it's a charming image nevertheless. Very nicely done. Nice old-fashioned look, not only in the B&W tones, but the clothing as well (though some of the boys' hairstyles are decidedly not old-fashioned unless your idea of old-fashioned is the 1970s).

It's hard to be entirely sure, but this looks to me like a use of selective color, with most of the image reduced to gray tones except for the glaring yellow grass (which is unbelievably bright considering it seems to be under a heavily overcast sky). Is there really no color in the buildings, the windmills, etc.? Even an overcast sky generally has hints of blue in the clouds, not the completely dead gray we see here, and the man standing on the right seems devoid of color as well (though it's hard to tell without a larger image). If I am correct about this, then I have to wonder why the grass, of all things -- the least interesting part of the picture -- is made to compete so strongly (by virtue of color) against the things that really matter here: the dog, the sheep, and the windmills. The effect is rather artificial, as selective color usually is; and this seems at odds with the rural scene, which might suggest a more natural, traditional approach. Also, darkish grays against slightly greenish yellows does not make for a particularly pleasant color scheme. When I try to visualize the image with gray grass, it seems more naturalistic, but also less eye-grabbing; but is eye-grabbing all that matters? I wonder if full color would have been better all around, but without the original image to compare, one can't really say. One thing that can be said for the selective color in this case is that it creates a sort of negative-space effect where attention is drawn from the dog and sheep up the road to the windmill and clouds -- but only after the initial reaction of noticing the bright, unbelievable, almost day-glo grass.

The dog, standing facing the sheep, looks like he is guarding or herding the sheep, preventing them from moving towards the camera. Centering him in the frame gives him a balanced place in the composition and a sense of strength, as if he's saying, "You sheep won't get past me. Don't even try." Meanwhile, the man off to the right adds a pleasant touch of asymmetry to the foreground.

It is interesting, and fortunate, that the photographer managed to catch the nearer windmills when nearly all of them had one vane pointing almost straight up. This emphasizes their verticality (is that a word? you get the idea) and makes the best use of the upper part of the frame.

In the end, the dog really makes this shot. Without it, there would be no sense of confrontation or drama in the foreground to match the dramatically dark clouds.

To sum up, I like the shot more than I like the post-production.

Alex, the "reason you stated" are technical trivia that are completely unimportant to this picture. You might as well complain that some of Rembrandt's paintings have "blocked shadows".

Someone earlier remarked that Marjorie's photo is "controversial". If so, it is only so because some people get too hung up on technical "rules" that may be valid as general guidelines but are nowhere near as absolute and universally applicable as they seem to think. You can have a great picture that has blown highlights, blocked shadows, or isn't perfectly focused. Cartier-Bresson once remarked that "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept"; he might as well have added that the same is true of all purely technical considerations. Technique is a servant of art, not its master.

This is one of the better PotW entries in recent memory. I like the composition, the shallow focus, and the B&W textures and tones. The girl, looking down and walking with her arms out, seems to be off in her own world of imagination. Good work!

I'm an American, though not a New Yorker, but I never associated this image with 9/11. Since I live and work within a few miles of at least four airfields (San Francisco International Airport, San Carlos Airport, Palo Alto Airport, and Moffett Field/NASA Ames Research Center), I'm used to seeing jetliners, small planes, military aircraft, and helicopters flying overhead, often quite low since they may have just taken off or may be on final approach.

I may be atypical, but it may also be that most Americans, at least those outside of the New York/DC area, are less obsessed with 9/11 than you might think. At this point I'm mostly just tired of seeing the subject dragged out in defense of every assault on our civil liberties that our power-mad Orwellian politicians and bureaucrats can imagine.

It's a striking image, and the barrel distortion doesn't bother me at all (unlike Alex). I think it probably was shot with a fisheye lens, though it may have been cropped a little; I don't know why Alex thinks it wasn't. I've never seen a zoom with THAT much barrel distortion!

One thing that does bother me about the image is that it looks to me like the plane was edited in digitally. The sun seems to be very low behind the photographer and a bit to his left, to judge from the shadows on the buildings and the fact that the street-facing side of the buildings on the left are not illuminated, while those on the right side are. Yet the plane shows illumination on the right-hand side, not the left. A picture like this that was a legitimate, un-touched-up capture would be a memory of a striking moment, but it's just trivial fakery if you edit in something that reality did not see fit to provide.

I have to agree with the comments so far. The scene and lighting are very nice, but the composition is poor due to the centering of the figure and the cropping so close to the head and feet. Also, I don't know what this picture is trying to say about this woman. I don't sense any real emotional content. She is looking off to the left of the frame and a bit upward, but it could be just boredom or mild curiosity. She has a case at her feet, but why? Is she waiting for a departure? Ambiguity is fine, but there has to be something intriguing about it, something that draws one in, but nothing really draws me in here but the lighting. It seems like the kind of picture one takes to test out a scene. Okay, nice start, but where's the real picture?

I'm also generally not fond of selective color, but this works pretty well due to the wintery situation. My only problems with this image are compositional. The tree is to the right of center and the red-coated figure pulls the picture even more to the right. The space to the left of the tree is effectively empty (just a couple of trees way off in the distance). Shifting the composition to the right would have improved this. I'd also like to see the apparent horizon leveled, which I think would add to the elemental simplicity of the image. I realize that it may be that the ground isn't actually quite level here, but the division between land and sky is pretty much a perfectly straight line and it's very close to level, so regardless of the actual geography I think I would have just leveled it.

It's an eye-catching image that clearly has been composed and processed very carefully. I feel certain the creator ended up with exactly the image he set out to make. But as Louis said, it's not clear what, if anything, the image is intended to communicate. For all its technical merits, it seems in the end to be merely a pleasant, fashionably enigmatic design exercise rather than meaningful art.

I like the B&W treatment, the light and texture of the background sky, but other than that I don't find the image to be particularly compelling. It has no real subject. It shows us a place, but there's nothing terribly interesting about the place and nothing happening there.

The high-key lighting and exposure is well done. The blue eyes stand out and draw the viewer's attention as they are presumably meant to do. The darker strands of hair add a bit of contrast, keeping the image from seeming too insubstantial, which is good. As a whole, though, I'm not fond of overly cutesy pictures of small children, which this basically is. It's too Anne Geddes for me, even if the child isn't dressed in a ladybug suit.

I'm not crazy about the distinctly squarish lights (a window? a scrim in front of a lamp?) in the girl's eyes, just to the left of the center of each pupil, but it's not a big deal.

I'm not sure what it is, but this picture looks really artificial to me. The skin's texture and consistency of color just seems too perfect, as if it's been airbrushed (or the Photoshop equivalent), and something seems odd about the fabric as well. The image just seems over-processed.

That aside, the single eye gives the figure a strangely cyclopean quality that seems to be at odds with the photographer's apparent intention of making the viewer feel sympathetic. Without that, it would just be a cloyingly sentimental image that allows Westerners to feel superior to foreign cultures where women are required to cover themselves, but with it, the picture is just kind of weird.

I do like the colors, though.

Very nice, very expressive. The two path-like areas of larger blocks keep the ground from seeming too monotonous and provide a horizontal and a diagonal to balance the vertical figure and the near-vertical diagonal of the walking stick. The deep focus and telephoto perspective work well. The tones and textures are very nice too, with the dark figure standing out against the light stones. The wind-blown cloak and the hand holding onto the hat really make the image.

It is rather striking, and the light tones and soft light help draw attention to the dark pupils of the eyes. Her face has a subtly luminous quality. At the same time, I'm not sure it's really a flattering portrait. Lighting from below tends to make people look creepy, and her lack of expression and the somewhat cold quality of the light add to that. I think the picture is well done in the sense that the photographer probably got exactly what he intended, but I have my doubts about the artistic judgment that defined that intention. If I had a picture of one of my daughters that produced the effect this picture does, I probably wouldn't want to look at it very often.