The guidelines for this assignment were to compose images that capture the excitement and adventure associated with traveling or journeying to a new location. Since traveling almost always involves some mode of transportation, it was recognized that the mode of transportation might be an important part of the story.
I thought Lorin did a great job composing the scene to include the snow-capped mountains in his image titled
Rio Grande Scenic Railroad 1. The exposure was spot-on; however the colors were a bit too saturated on my monitor. I suspect this was because the image didn't have an embedded color profile.
Rio Grande Scenic Railroad 1Photographed by Lorin Schroeder (wildshutter)
Lorin's
Rio Grande Scenic Railroad 2 was another outstanding composition, with the shallow s-bend in the track effectively pulling the viewer deep into the scene. Exposure was great, with beautiful color rendering (although again it was perhaps a bit too saturated due to the lack of an embedded color profile.) Outstanding image Lorin, with wonderful depth. It definitely evokes the sense of traveling through beautiful scenery on a wonderful adventure. Of all the images submitted for the assignment this one "pulls me in" the most and makes me want to see what's just around the next bend. I've awarded this image
Editor's Choice for Artistic Merit.
Rio Grande Scenic Railroad 2Editor's Choice for Artistic MeritPhotographed by Lorin Schroeder (wildshutter)
Alan said it best when he commented on Lorin's image of
Rio Grande Scenic Railroad 3, saying "If you take a hundred shots of this train in most of them you see a lackluster train. But is this photo the train takes on character and you spend that minute thinking about the train." I agree. This image of the train evokes character. The image was very well composed, with the track forming a nice leading line into the scene, and the train nicely positioned in the frame for maximum impact. The fact that the engineer is visible through the window adds a human element and a sense of scale to the image. (Excellent choice of aperture too.) Another outstanding image Lorin, with excellent clarity and well deserving of
Editor's Choice for Technical Merit.
Rio Grande Scenic Railroad 3Editor's Choice for Technical MeritPhotographed by Lorin Schroeder (wildshutter)
Jaime continued the string of outstanding compositions with his
Cheaper Air Travel image. Jaime did a great job composing the image so that it evokes the dynamic excitement of the show, with the smoke leading the viewer's gaze in a looping pattern to the plane, and then providing a dynamic path for the plane to follow. Outstanding job capturing and evoking the moment.
Cheaper Air Travel....Photographed by Jaime Dorotan (girod)
I enjoyed Lars' image of
Expensive Travel, evoking those travel days of yore. Somehow this image brought to mind all those scenes from old movies with cars like this speeding across the American landscape, blond hair flying. I like the way Lars filled the frame and then cropped the image to accentuate the wide chrome grill and enormous hood. (Yup, there's a gas guzzling American V8 lurking under that hood.)
Expensive TravelPhotographed by Lars
Julie's
Pedestrians Ahead image did a wonderful job evoking the "sense of place" and the experience of driving Trail Ridge Road in Rocky Mountain National Park. Julie did a great job capturing the texture of the snow, and this image brought back memories of driving through an area with snow towering over the car. (I'd be interested to know the focal length and aperture of this image.)
Pedestrians Ahead Photographed by Julie Schroeder (WriteHeart)
was another fun image by Julie. (I liked the double reflection of the scene in the mirror.)
Saying GoodbyePhotographed by Julie Schroeder (WriteHeart)
I enjoyed Michele's image of
M&Ms?, and it too brought back memories of being in the mountains (and some wonderful ski trips). It's interesting how a small "vignette" like this can evoke memories of the much larger scene or location. I think that feeling is helped along by the wonderful depth of this image, caused mainly by the use of linear perspective to draw the viewer into the scene (which enables them to imagine the scene around them).
M&Ms?Photographed by MIchele Bollhalder
I enjoyed watching McKenzie and Rebecca enjoy the ride
On the Train, and hope I captured some of that sense of adventure in this image.
On the TrainPhotographed by Keith
Luc's image of a
mother and young mountain goat above the cliff at Creux du Vau was an amazing environmental portrait that helped illustrate the remarkable lives of these animals that live on the cliffs. Misty scenes are very difficult to expose and render well, and Luc did an outstanding job with this scene.
mother and young mountain goat above the cliff at Creux du VauPhotographed by Luc Bigler
Just out of curiosity, I thought I would try a bit of selective sharpening on the near bushes in the scene in order to accentuate the "atmospheric perspective" of the mist. Here's the result:
mother and young mountain goat above the cliff at Creux du VauPhotographed by Luc Bigler
Luc's
young mountain goat above the cliffs of Creux du Vau, Switzerland was another beautiful image, although perhaps just a bit soft in the eyes. I added a bit of selective sharpening the the mountain goat's face, and then increased the mid-tone contrast just a touch in that area of the image to better draw the viewer to the goat's eyes.
young mountain goat above the cliffs of Creux du Vau, SwitzerlandPhotographed by Luc Bigler
young mountain goat above the cliffs of Creux du Vau, SwitzerlandPhotographed by Luc Bigler, slective sharpening by Keith
My image of the
White Pass Railway was captured with a wide angle lens in order to accentuate the length of the train, and the scale of the scene. I suspect this image would have been more successful if I would have leaned out farther from the train in order to include more of the car directly in front of the camera (and accentuate the change in size of the train cars even more).
White Pass RailwayPhotographed by Keith
As I mentioned in my description for the "Anti-HDR" assignment, I thought Marilyn did a great job composing the scene in her
Through the tunnel image. By zooming in tight, she both eliminated the high contrast areas from the scene and made the composition stronger by concentrating the viewer's attention on the key parts of the scene (the trestle and tunnel). Great job Marilyn, and well deserving of
People's Choice.
Through the tunnelPeople's ChoicePhotographed by Marilyn McKinney
Marilyn's
Locomotive Reflections was a fun and creative image too. I'll have to try something similar next time I'm lucky enough to get to ride a train.
Locomotive ReflectionsPhotographed by Marilyn McKinney
Michele captured a beautiful scene in her
Area of Schwyz image. When I saw this image I thought "wow," and then thought how amazing this scene would look in more dramatic light. I decided to try my hand at one of Dave's techniques of "light painting." In this case, I added a layer, increased the mid-tone contrast, then added a mask and "brushed" in the contrast in the valley, enhancing the effect of the light dappling the valley. I've posted the modified image just below Michele's original so you can see the effect. (I tried to keep it fairly subtle so that the final results wouldn't look artificial.)
Area of SchwyzPhotographed by MIchele Bollhalder
Area of SchwyzPhotographed by MIchele Bollhalder, light painting (mid-tone contrast) added by Keith
Rebecca did a great job pulling up the shadows and rescuing the shot in her image titled
And we got to see Denali!. It was a challenge enough to get the group to cooperate for the shot, but given enough time I might have pulled the camera back a little further from the group and used a longer telephoto lens to make Denali look larger. Hmmm, maybe I should have left the 200-400mm on the tripod for her?
And we got to see Denali!Photographed by Rebecca
Chris'
Dirt Road was a fairly simple image, but I really liked the composition and mood of the image, which I thought did a great job of evoking the feeling of driving ranch roads in rural Kansas (and the slight apprehension you get when driving into a storm). As I mentioned in the gallery comments, the colors were a bit too saturated on my display, but I think this is due to the image not having an embedded color profile. Chris and I figured out that this was because he was using the "save for web" option in Photoshop, which strips out the metadata (including color space) in it's default configuration.
Dirt RoadPhotographed by Chris Franklin
Chris' image of
Soden's Grove Park was a nice image of the park, but I wonder if he could have used the tracks a little more effectively (much like he used the road in his image above) to draw the viewer into the image?
Soden's Grove ParkPhotographed by Chris Franklin
Chris'
Bicycling image was a nice portrait in flattering (soft) light. I like that Chris didn't center his subject in the frame, and thought he did a great job with the composition. The image makes me want to get out there exploring on a bike too, so I'd say it was a success.
BicyclingPhotographed by Chris Franklin
Thank you to everyone that participated in this assignment. I really enjoyed traveling with you (through your images) to different parts of the world.
Keith
