Thank you to everyone that participated in the "Wild" assignment. The
guidelines for this assignment were to simply create an image portraying something wild, such as a wild place, wildlife or wildflowers, or wild emotions.
I really appreciated the image Dave posted of the scene
Below the Beaver Dam. Every now and then I need to daydream about exploring wild places, and this image gave me a little bit of the fix that I needed. Thank you Dave. I think all of us need a reminder from time to time that the world is not made of concrete and pavement and manicured lawns. This image had a wonderful depth that served to draw me into the scene. In past assignments we've talked about including "near, middle, far" elements in the scene in order to convey a sense of depth, and this image is a great example of how that can work. By including the near bush, the middle beaver dam, and the far shore with the trees, Dave provides the elements required for the viewer to develop a sense of scale and distance. The wonderful light on the distant shore serves to draw us further into the scene. I can almost hear the buzz of the insects that are sure to inhabit this swampy area. This was a wonderful image Dave, thank you for sharing your adventures and fueling my dreams.
Below the Beaver DamPhotographed by Dave Leiker
Dave's
Arkansas Stream in the Wild was another wonderful image that made me want to explore. The light on the far bank and spilling onto the trees effectively drew me into the scene, and then the dark opening in the trees to the right piqued my curiosity and made me want to step into the opening to see what might be hidden around the corner. Very effective use of light to add interest to this scene. I can honestly say this is the first time I have been conscious of the use of shadows (instead of light) to draw me further into a scene. I'm not sure that would work often, but in this instance it works very well, perhaps because the topic is "wild" and I was predisposed to explore. I also think the jumble of tree limbs at the base of the tree added to the sense of "wildness." I would normally try to avoid including a wild jumble in my compositions, and prefer them to be clean and simple; however, including the jumble in this composition certainly added to the sense of place created by the image.
Arkansas Stream in the WildPhotographed by Dave Leiker
Michele's
Startled image was a wonderfully dynamic portrait that appeared to capture the personality of her subject. I thought Michele did an extremely good job of balancing the flash and ambient light in this image. This was a very strong, well balanced composition. As we talked about in the image comments in the gallery, I loved the background, although I cautioned that a background with that much character probably wouldn't work for a model that didn't have as much contrast in the eyes to draw our attention. I've said in the past that it is the lighter areas in an image that draw our attention; however, it it probably more accurate to say that it is the high contrast areas that draw our attention the most. We're also naturally drawn to the eyes, so the combination of Jo's bright eyes (and white teeth) against her dark complexion really draw our attention. As I mentioned in the gallery comments, this is one of the best portraits I've seen in a long time, and I've awarded this image
Editor's Choice for Artistic and Technical Merit.
StartledEditor's Choice for Artistic and Technical MeritPhotographed by Michele Bollhalder
Michele's
It's all in the eyes image was another strong composition, although I think it might have been stronger with a "crisper" rendition of the eyes, especially if she would have been able to capture a catchlight in the eyes.
It's all in the eyesPhotographed by Michele Bollhalder
In the rendition below, I tried to enhance the eyes without going overboard. I used layer masks in Photoshop to isolate the eyes, then applied a levels adjustment to increase the contrast, and then desaturated that portion of the image to counteract the addition of a greenish tint in the shadows that was added by the levels adjustment. Then I added a slight amount of sharpening to the eyes, and enhanced the catchlight. Here are the results:
It's all in the eyesPhotographed by Michele Bollhalder, minor Photoshop adjustments by Keith
Jaime's
".....people hearing without listening..." image was a great capture of a wonderful moment. I know Jaime was anxious to capture great images of this memorable event, and all the effort he put into learning the technical aspects of his camera and lens and digital exposure techniques really came together in this series of images. Jaime didn't just "point and shoot," but consciously planned his settings to optimize the image quality. He used manual exposure and spot metering, and selected an aperture of f8 (to compensate for the degradation in image quality from the 2x teleconverter) and an ISO of 1600, which he knew would provide images with a minimum of noise while enabling a high enough shutter speed (1/200th) to minimize blur from subject movement. Awesome job Jaime, and congratulations on capturing such a wonderful series of images.
".....people hearing without listening..."Photographed by Jaime Dorotan
Congratulations to Evan, whose
"Wild" Rabbit image was selected as
People's Choice. What makes this image exceptional? "It's all in the eyes!" It's fun to see Evan get so excited about photography, although it made me a little nervous to return to where they were photographing only to find that he had picked up the tripod with D3 and 200-400mm f4 lens and carted it across the brick patio to photograph in the garden.
Great job Evan, keep up the good work.
"Wild" RabbitPhotographed by Evan
McKenzie's
Peter Rabbit image was fun too, and with a little help from Evan she managed to capture some interesting behavior. Of course that interesting behavior was because the rabbit was spooked by McKenzie yelling "my turn!, my turn!" as she tried to wrest the camera from Evan's grasp. Thank you Evan for giving your sister a turn and helping take this wonderful picture of Peter Rabbit.
Peter RabbitPhotographed by McKenzie (Evan helped her focus on the rabbit)
Thank you to everyone that participated in this assignment, and for sharing your wonderful images. Viewers are encouraged to respond to this thread describing why you like a particular image, or think it was particularly successful at meeting the guidelines of the assignment.
Keith
