Something? - Carnival Couple

seastack

This photo haunts me a bit. I think it could have been great, the kind of image from the edge of an event that I am looking for, but I think it has a fatal flaw.

Still, I'll ask, does it work? Why, or why not? Please feel free to be painfully honest on anything I post here. I've been flayed in public by the best.

bdcolen

Very, very close. Evocative; amazing light; great shadows and use of them - look at the way the man is intersecting perfectly with the curving shadow of the lawn, and his shadow meets the base of the tree; perfection. Great couple, great colors, great dog. So why isn't this as good as it could be? Two reasons: first, I want the tower to bisect the couple - you should have just shifted to your left about one step. And the ride on the left disrupts, rather than completes, the image. Perhaps if we saw more of it, and/or if you had used a slower shutter speed and had gotten some blurr there, it might have worked.

So it's very nice; it's a keeper. I see why you love it. But could it be improved? Definitely.

How's that?

seastack

bdcolen wrote: »

Very, very close. Evocative; amazing light; great shadows and use of them - look at the way the man is intersecting perfectly with the curving shadow of the lawn, and his shadow meets the base of the tree; perfection. Great couple, great colors, great dog. So why isn't this as good as it could be? Two reasons: first, I want the tower to bisect the couple - you should have just shifted to your left about one step. And the ride on the left disrupts, rather than completes, the image. Perhaps if we saw more of it, and/or if you had used a slower shutter speed and had gotten some blurr there, it might have worked.

So it's very nice; it's a keeper. I see why you love it. But could it be improved? Definitely.

How's that?

Yep ) What I thought. That damn tower haunts me!!! I don't understand why I didn't take a step. Basic composition, and I had the time. Moving too damn fast I guess. This photo does serve its purpose though. It reminds to take the time to frame it right!!!

r3t1awr3yd

I guess the eyes is what makes us all different but...

I would have gotten lower, a little closer, and moved right.

He looks like he's looking @ the tower and she looks like she's looking more towards the zipper. I would have tried to place them in between the rides.

Other than that, I LOVE the DOF and hate the tree. lol.

seastack

r3t1awr3yd wrote: »

I guess the eyes is what makes us all different but...

I would have gotten lower, a little closer, and moved right.

He looks like he's looking @ the tower and she looks like she's looking more towards the zipper. I would have tried to place them in between the rides.

Other than that, I LOVE the DOF and hate the tree. lol.

Yeah, that might've worked too. So damn close. But hey, great photos are often made with very subtle minor adjustments. And, ha ha, sorry about the tree )

NeilL

seastack wrote: »

great photos are often made with very subtle minor adjustments.

I definitely agree with you there! But I'm thinking about adjustments in post.

It's all very well to imagine what the image might have been after it's a done affair and in front of you. But there are an infinite number of images which might have been, different to this actual one. There's a trap in going too far along that track of thought, I think.

I think when you took this shot you might not have framed it in your mind with everything in it that we can now see in it. I think you were blocking out parts of what was in your vision. IRL, although maybe 120deg is visible to us, we are conscious of far less. The camera viewfinder view is much, much different to our conscious looking view (I know you don't need to be told such things, so forgive me). I think you were shooting for what your mind could see rather than what you saw in the viewfinder.

I think part of your unease with this image is due to not seeing in it what you saw when you took it, or more accurately seeing too much in it.

My suggestion would be to crop it in on the right to close to the guy's right elbow, letting the curve of lawn anchor him there, and crop down to a whisker above the flags on the tower. I think you might find as well that the verticals of the figures and the tower, the horizontals of the shadows and the lawn edge, and the diagonals of the rides and the retiring lawn edge on the right become far more playful and powerful. The blue vs green also might become a more intense dynamic. I would be tempted, too, to tilt the image ~2deg to the right. When I do it looking through my fingers it seems to improve the relationship of the tower to the figures, and to the right frame edge (but that's possibly going too "fringe").

Neil

bdcolen

I have essentially two rules in my classes, one of which is the "no bums" rule, which has nothing to do with the present discussion. The other is the "no tilting unless" rule, which is as follows:

Horizons are called that because they are...horizontal. A tilted horizon ( or Godforbid, an element tilted in post-processing ) indicates the photographer was:

A. Lazy - there is virtually no more common, faddish way to try to turn a dull image 'interesting' than by tilting the camera. That doesn't produce an 'interesting' image, it produces a tilted crappy image;

B. The photographer was drunk;

C. The photographer stumbled;

D. The photographer has legs of different lengths;

E. The photographer tilted the camera in order to include in the photo elements he or she otherwise couldn't because of the limitations of the focal length lenses on hand.

Am I 'old school?' Am I 'so last century?' Do I lack the 'creative vision' we see in every black-clad art school freshman? God but I hope so. Because if the former list is not accurate, then I really lack fundamental understanding of the ethos of the particular forms of photography on this particular list is all about.