The
guidelines for this assignment were to photograph a scene in the Contre-Jour style, which is a photographic style of shooting into the light to produce high contrast, dynamic, and somewhat impressionistic images of your subject.
Jaime did a great job controlling the exposure in his
Colors in Light image, and a nice job balancing the brightness of the foreground statues with the stained glass window. Beautiful image Jaime.
Colors in LightPhotographed by Jaime Dorotan (girod)
I enjoyed the intense color, strong composition, and atmospheric effects in Julie's
Into the Fire image.
Into the FirePhotographed by Julie Schroeder (WriteHeart)
Julie's
Into the Clouds image was a great example of the Contre-Jour style, with bright, almost overpowering backlighting and a very strong, dynamic composition that is almost impressionistic in its simplicity.
Into the CloudsPhotographed by Julie Schroeder (WriteHeart)
Julie's
Into the Sun is another good example, although the composition isn't quite as strong or dynamic as her
Into the Clouds image. It was a great idea to convert this image to monochrome so that the colors did not distract.
Into the SunPhotographed by Julie Schroeder (WriteHeart)
Luc's series of images of frost on the leaves did a wonderful job of capturing the detail of the very delicate ice crystals. His middle image was my favorite. The backlighting helped accentuate the fine detail, and the softly blurred background complemented the scene well. Everything came together nicely in this middle image, with a very nice balance between detailed subject and softly blurred background that provided just enough "context" for the scene.
heavy frost on leaves 30.11.10Photographed by Luc Bigler
more leaves gripped by frost 30.11.10Photographed by Luc Bigler
heavy frost on leaves IIPhotographed by Luc Bigler
I did think Luc's images could benefit from a little post-capture sharpening, and so pulled the middle image into Photoshop and added just a touch of Smart Sharpen to help accentuate the detail in the ice crystals:
more leaves gripped by frost 30.11.10Photographed by Luc Bigler, sharpened by Keith
Chris did a nice job cropping his
Out of the Cage image to remove distracting detail and help focus the viewers attention on the primary subject. His decision to convert the image to black and white was also a good one, since this helped to alleviate any color issues caused by the mixed lighting.
Out of the CagePhotographed by Chris Franklin
Lars'
Into the fog was a beautiful image that reminded me of a painting. The combination of linear perspective (diminishing size of the road) and atmospheric perspective provided by the fog was very effective at providing a sense of depth and helping to draw the viewer into the scene. At first I wasn't quite sure that I liked the cars parked on the side of the road, but then I realized they helped draw the viewer's eyes deep into the scene. One small thing that caught my attention was the yellow splash of color on the pole in the right side of the image. I thought this splash of color drew my attention a little too much, and so I pulled the image into Photoshop and desaturated the color on the pole and used a layer mask to combine the desaturated pole with the original image. I've posted the modified image below for you to see. It's a very subtle difference, but I'm no longer distracted by the color of the post in the modified version.
Into The fogPhotographed by Lars
Into The fogPhotographed by Lars, desaturated pole by Keith
Lars'
Winter Grass was an outstanding image, with sharp detail and texture in the grass and snow, and a softly out of focus background with shapes and textures that complemented the "flow" of the grass. Very well done Lars. I'm not sure however that the bright spot in the background complemented this scene. In my opinion it grabbed too much of my attention without contributing to the overall concept of the image.
Winter grassPhotographed by Lars
Lars'
Frozen Sailor was a nicely composed, whimsical image, and one that took on more interest if the viewer took the time to examine the image in more detail. I loved the snowy beard on the sailor's chin and the other accents provided by the ice crystals. Good eye and very nice composition Lars.
Frozen sailorPhotographed by Lars
Rick's
Old Wagon at Sunset was a beautiful image. It's actually a bit too serene to fit into my concept of what I consider the Contre-Jour style, which typically incorporates very bold backlighting and a dynamic, almost impressionistic composition. It's a beautiful image nonetheless.
Old Wagon at SunsetPhotographed by Rick Pepin (TrvlRick)
Michele's image of
Lauren by my bedroom window is a nearly perfect rendition of a very challenging scene. I've learned from experience that shooting directly into the light very rarely results in anything worth saving, so I've gotten into a habit of avoiding those shots. This assignment has been a great reminder that I shouldn't automatically dismiss a potential image just because I would be shooting into the light. Michele's image is beautiful, with an outstanding composition, great exposure, rich tones, depth that draws the viewer into the scene and a "feeling" that makes the viewer wish they were the one sitting there enjoying the warmth of the sun and the magical winter scene. I like that Lauren is placed slightly off center and somewhat small in the frame. She becomes a supporting element in the image and doesn't dominated the scene too much. This is simply an outstanding image in all respects and I've selected it as
Editor's Choice for Artistic and Technical Merit. In addition, this image won the vote for
People's Choice. Congratulations Michele, and thank you for inspiring us with this outstanding image.
Lauren by my bedroom windowPeople's Choice and
Editor's Choice for Artistic and Technical MeritPhotographed by Michele Bollhalder
Michele's
It's a big world out there... is another successful image. I think Michele did a great job composing the image to support her theme. She placed Lauren so that she was fairly small within the frame and dominated by the "big world" outside the window. I wonder though if this one would have also been a bit more effective if Lauren would have been placed off center? It's hard to say without trying it...
It's a big world out there...Photographed by Michele Bollhalder
Marilyn's
Merlot by candle light was another very creative image, with a bit of mystery to it. It's a fairly simple composition, but this image continued to grow on me the more I looked at it. I like the play of light, and the rich tones barely perceptible in the wine.
VERY nice job Marilyn.
Merlot by candle light
Photographed by Marilyn McKinney
I don't know how you all feel, but to me this was a very successful assignment. I pushed myself to look for and photograph scenes "against the light" and managed to produce at least one successful image. I was also very inspired by the images you all produced, and will consider Contre-Jour to be a new style in my repertoire. Thank you again for sharing your images and your inspiration.
Keith