17 Trees

[AlwaysOnAuto]

My only problem with it is that when I'm viewing it on my monitor either the sky is cut off or the trees are as I can't get the whole image on the screen at once.
I guess you could say I'm monitor challenged.

[Donald]

Alan - Try clicking on the image so that you view it in the Lightbox. Does that help?

[John 2]

I quite like this Donald but not as much as some of your others. Your technique of using a portrait format to express space always works well. The clouds, especially with the tonal gradient from the top, provide plenty of interest but I'm not so comfortable with the composition at ground level. I think it's the split between left and right. The telegraph pole isn't quite strong enough to fill the gap and the tree on the RHS is a bit too far out. Just my thoughts however. Don't hate me.

[NorthernFocus]

Sorry, Donald, but I just can't see anything but those power lines. So unless they are your main subject it's not working for me. And if they are, I'm just not getting it

[Wavelength]

Even though the idea of presenting this image was not to verify the exactness of the number of trees, it is quite in the human nature to verify the number mentioned in the title...obviously the number is incorrect and the discussion was divulged*....(digressed* , i meant )

I always love expanses of sky as the background of landscape and this is a beautiful one showing the diminutive-ness of the trees... i am not sure whether increasing the contrast a bit more would make it even better

[mknittle]

Oh well. To save others devoting their energies to counting the trees and not assessing the image, let's change the title to 'Lots of Trees'!

Sorry Donald I was just kidding.

[mknittle]

Thank you all for your comments ... and sorry for the misunderstanding re my post about number of trees.

I've always taken the view that I'm at my most creative, innovative and productive when I'm happy and relaxed. I know that some artists are at their best when their mood is very low and sombre.

Today I was in that latter category (I won't bore you with the details). I forced myself to take the camera with me when I went out to the nearby small town for some provisions, although I 'knew' I wouldn't use it. Well, on the way home I forced myself to stop the car and get out and look at a scene that I had noticed on the way down to town. This image is the result of that.

So, mood is all.

Sorry to hear that Donald.

[Urbanflyer]

It works for me. The sky is luscious!

[JBW]

Here's another of those 'all sky and little land' images for folks to debate. Some quite liked this sort of approach when I made an image of similar proportions previously. Others absolutely did not like it all.

Well hopefully this one can stir up some discussion.

Your comments and critique are always read and studied.

Mood is indeed all which makes me wonder where mine is at right now.

If it was my shot I would eliminate all of the trees, power lines and poles except the single large tree at the bottom right.

[bnnrcn]

It is about the feelings Donald. IMO the grain gives the image some kind of stressfull mood. If there wasn't grain then the sky would look smoother and dreamy . Then I would feel relaxed and the image would possibly take me to a mystical world. I hope I have chosen the right words and expressed myself properly Well may be you have reflected your mood to the image with that grain , I don't know

Again, thank you for your posts


Binnur - What is it you don't like about the grain you see in the sky?

[bnnrcn]

My monitor has eagle eyes Mike

PS.Sorry for using the wrong word It is my laptop screen, not my monitor.

I don't see any noise or grain. I only see tonal variation in the clouds.

[Tony M]

I always enjoy looking at your photos Donald, especially because they are often of your native land. I like this style of photo; but there is something that niggles a bit. Whilst the protagonist is the sky, my eyes are drawn from it too soon, down to the empty space between the right-most tree and the others, and they fall upon the telephone pole. I don't have anything against telephone poles personally , but this one is unfortunately placed.

The processing is very nice; I like the medium-to-low contrast and the grainy effect.

Tony

[Brev00]

I like the image and don't mind the ratio. It feels a bit cramped to me as there is so much space above yet little space for the trees on the left and right extremes. Also, a cloudscape this sculpted calls attention to itself-- to the processing. I would relax on the microcontrast a bit. .

[Donald]

Well may be you have reflected your mood to the image with that grain , I don't know

Thank you Binnur.

Like Mike, I'm not sure that what we have is grain. Rather it is the enhanced tonal differences brought out by using the sliders in Silver Efex Pro to enhance the blacks and whites in the sky.

But for the purposes of this discussion that is irrelevant. What you have done is very correctly suggested that my mood at the time of capturing this photograph is reflected in the finished image. As I have said in the thread, it was not a good day. I was feeling very unhappy and, at that moment, unable to do anything about solving an issue in a personal relationship. The clouds very accurately represent my mood at the time. I am happy to say that matters now have been all resolved.

[Mike Buckley]

I am happy to say that matters now have been all resolved.

Blue skies ahead for you (even though they'll be displayed here in grey scale)!

[bnnrcn]

Hi Donald, I'm verry happy to hear that you solved the issue which bothered you and you are not unhappy anymore BTW you are right that, that grain-like look might be coming from SEP2 as we all know that SEP2 sometimes does such things.

Thank you Binnur.

Like Mike, I'm not sure that what we have is grain. Rather it is the enhanced tonal differences brought out by using the sliders in Silver Efex Pro to enhance the blacks and whites in the sky.

But for the purposes of this discussion that is irrelevant. What you have done is very correctly suggested that my mood at the time of capturing this photograph is reflected in the finished image. As I have said in the thread, it was not a good day. I was feeling very unhappy and, at that moment, unable to do anything about solving an issue in a personal relationship. The clouds very accurately represent my mood at the time. I am happy to say that matters now have been all resolved.

[billtils]

This discussion brings to mind the following quote from Week 3 of the MoMA online class (see the thread here): “Photography is not about the thing photographed. It is about how that thing looks photographed.” (Garry Winogrand). This image is not about trees or sky or power lines, or Donald's mood, it is about what you want to "see", but it will have meaning in one or more of these areas for each of us who looks at it (and for Donald who created it). I liked it as soon as I saw it but for different reasons - there is a story in the vast expanse of ethereal cloud contrasting with the clarity and detail in the line of foreground. Perhaps Donald, there was something subconscious in your title - your excursion brought clarity but with something not quite adding up ...

I have always been conflicted on doing things like removing ugly power lines. If we want to capture something specific but where our view contains distractions, shouldn't we try to find a better vantage point? And are they always detrimental to the image - I rather like the power lines here, a nice reminder of human intervention.

Sorry for the ramble - blame it on MoMA

[Mike Buckley]

If we want to capture something specific but where our view contains distractions, shouldn't we try to find a better vantage point?

Perhaps and perhaps not. It really depends on one's thinking on at least a couple of levels.

On the philosophical level, eliminating a distracting object is just another capability that we have when making adjustments to our images. So, each of us has to decide philosophically for ourselves where to draw the line. Certainly, that line might be drawn at different places depending on the genre, such as whether the photo is journalistic, documentary for the purpose of advertising a product or service, or fine art.

On the practical level, I remember a tree I was photographing in South Africa in ideal light and I was actually thinking of Donald at the time. I was on an intense schedule requiring that I arrive at my destination a long way away before dark. There was no time to spend walking through rural farmland trying to find a better vantage point that eliminated the distracting elements. Also knowing I would probably never return to the scene, I had two practical options: I could capture the image knowing there were distractions in the scene that I would want to remove during post-processing or not capture the image. I chose the former option.

On another practical level, it might take so long to find a vantage point that has no distracting elements that we lose the ideal light. The choices about what to do go on and on depending on the situation.

Everyone needs to make these decisions for themselves.

[billtils]

Absolutely Mike. I suspect most of us would do the same, I certainly would. The key phrase in the quote is "try to find".