Thank you to everyone that participated in the "Unexpected" assignment, I enjoyed seeing your images. Carrying my camera around with me has always been a great catalyst to get me into an "exploring" mood, and I hope you enjoyed a few unexpected moments of discovery during the assignment.
The guidelines for this assignment were simply to submit an image of an "unexpected" moment or scene that we could appreciate for its beauty or insight.
I loved the way the way Dave started us off on the assignment with his image of the
Lock Mechanism. I think many of us appreciated the workmanship evident in this intricate piece of machinery, and miss the days when such pride in workmanship seemed more commonplace. With an image like this, it is easy to admire the subject and forget about the craftsmanship necessary to create such a wonderful image. Dave did a great job handling the exposure and capturing an image with the clarity needed to help us appreciate the subject. Taking advantage of the soft available light definitely helped Dave record this image with wonderful tonality and color and very nice detail and clarity. It would have been tempting to use a flash to provide more light on the scene, but I suspect that would have resulted in harsh glare and detail robbing high contrast.. Very nicely done Dave, and deserving of
People's Choice and
Editor's Choice for Artistic and Technical Merit. (And thank you for rewarding my faith that even though the "Unexpected" assignment was a bit ambiguous, you guys would come through with inspiring images.)
Lock MechanismPeople's Choice and
Editor's Choice for Artistic and Technical MeritPhotographed by Dave Leiker (prairiedust)
Michele did a great job capturing the moment in her image titled
A sweet moment. It's nearly impossible to capture these types of moments without having your camera "dialed in" beforehand. Dialing in the exposure (both ambient and flash) for the venue enables you to react quickly to these fleeting moments, without worrying about the exposure, or having to mess with the camera and miss the shot. I can see from the EXIF information that Michele was shooting in manual exposure, and I would guess from the well-balanced ambient and flash exposures that she had taken the time before this moment to set up her camera so that she could appropriately balance her flash exposures with the ambient light. Great job being "on your toes" and capturing this fleeting moment Michele.
A sweet momentPhotographed by Michele Bollhalder
Thank you for all the positive comments on my
Surprise Lily image. I had gone to Botanica specifically to photograph the water lilies, and had a preconceived notion of what I wanted to create. I never made it to the water lilies though, since I saw these lilies tucked away in the woods and stopped to photograph them along the way. The light was constantly changing, and I chose this image because the light filtering through the trees helped to highlight the lilies while letting the background go dark. I would normally photograph flowers much closer, but wanted to capture the long stems to reinforce the notion that these flower stalks literally sprang up from nowhere.
Surprise Lily Photographed by Keith
I think it is awesome that Marilyn noticed and then took the time to capture the glimmer of a rainbow in the high thin clouds. Just one more reminder that this is a fascinating world that we live in. I'm guessing this was an extremely challenging very high contrast scene, and Marilyn did a nice job pulling up the shadows to rescue the exposure in this image. This image does a nice job conveying the feel of a hot summer evening.
Unexpected rainbowPhotographed by Marilyn McKinney
The wonderful colors in Luc's image of the
unexpected harvest of mirabelles definitely helped convey a lifelike representation of the plums, which made the viewer want to reach into the image, grab a plum and take a bite. The detail, clarity and color of the green leaves, along with the modeling provided by the sidelight on the plums contributed to the three dimensional depth in this image and enhanced the feeling that one could reach into the image and grab a plum. Nicely done!
unexpected harvest of mirabellesPhotographed by Luc Bigler
Sue did a great job capturing the zebra image, especially since I know what she meant when she said "he wouldn't stop moving." Given how active that zebra is (we stopped to visit him one day when we were visiting with Rick and Sue), she did a great job capturing an image that was free of motion blur. (I might have been tempted to accentuate the highlight in the eye a bit for this image, probably by using the dodge tool in Photoshop.)
Zebra in Colorado ??
Photographed by Sue Pepin
Rick captured an amazing level of detail in his
Friendly Hummingbirds! image, thanks to the very sharp macro lens, optimum aperture and very fast shutter speed (made possible by bumping up the ISO). This was a very nicely balanced composition as well. (Note: Sometimes in images like this, if the saturated reds pull too much of the viewer's attention you can selectively desaturate that part of the image, while potentially increasing the contrast on the subject itself in order to direct the viewer's attention towards the subject.)
Friendly Hummingbirds!Photographed by Rick Pepin
Friendly Hummingbirds!Photographed by Rick Pepin (reduced saturation in feeder)
Note how the subtle changes in saturation (feeder) and contrast (throat of the hummingbird) shifted the emphasis in the image. (Look at each image and note where your attention is drawn.)
Chris' three images were nice examples of how having a camera in hand can help us to see and appreciate the unexpected scenes in life. Both his
Electric Clearing and
4 Wheelin' had strong graphic designs and nicely balanced compositions that helped the viewer appreciate the unexpected beauty in those scenes.
PupsPhotographed by Chris Franklin
Electric ClearingPhotographed by Chris Franklin
4 Wheelin'Photographed by Chris Franklin
Thank you again to everyone that participated in this assignment. I loved seeing what you came up with.
