Head's Up!

[Manfred M]

This is a shot up the lower part of one of the main masts of the USS Constitution, showing the rigging and of course the brilliant blue sky.

[DougR]

Works for me. Very nice clear shot with great color.

[Ziggy]

Nice lines.

[Shadowman]

Nicely done.

[Mike Buckley]

Your image effectively reminds me how crazy the people are who climb those rope ladders.

[deetheturk]

Lovely capture Manfred, great vision!

[Donald]

That is superb. Wonderfully imaginative and creative. Sometimes, in the rush to know all things technical, we forget that the great images are not the result of technical knowledge (though that helps), but of the artistic vision of the person behind the camera. This is the perfect example of that. How many people who visit that vessel, would have thought to look at this scene as a possible picture?

[bnnrcn]

You have a great eye for seeing shapes and patterns and framing them very nicely Manfred

[AlwaysOnAuto]

If Manfred will allow me, I'd like to post a picture my father took some time in the early '50's.

[Manfred M]

If Manfred will allow me, I'd like to post a picture my father took some time in the early '50's.

Please go ahead Alan.

[AlwaysOnAuto]

This is from a family slide I copied with my macro lens to digitize it.

[Manfred M]

This is from a family slide I copied with my macro lens to digitize it.

It looks like the pieces that were missing during our visit were in place when your father took this shot. I have some shots that I haven't posted with the spars and other piece of mast in storage on land. That's were all the guns were too.

[Jimr1961]

I absolutely love the way the cloud lines parallel the rigging lines. Makes for the dizzying feel.

[Manfred M]

I absolutely love the way the cloud lines parallel the rigging lines. Makes for the dizzying feel.

Some of those clouds are contrails from commercial jets. Boston's Logan Airport is nearby and there were plenty of contrails in the sky that day, left by the arriving and departing aircraft.

[Jimr1961]

Yeah, I noticed that. And, as they are slowly blown up and camera right, they add the same right angle assemblage that the rigging does.

[gregj1763]

Very nice Manfred, love the colours and the rigging coming from the corners work well as a vanishing point in the image

[rpcrowe]

I love that shot and I am mesmerized every time I visit a sailing ship and look up the rigging.

We have three permanent sailing ships in our San Diego Maritime Museum; the schooner Californian, the Star of India which is an iron hulled sailing ship and the H.M.S. Rose which was the ship featured in the Russell Crowe (no relation to me) film, "Master and Commander, The Far Side of the World" based on the Patrick O'Brian series of novels.

http://rpcrowe.smugmug.com/Boats/SAN...RITIME-MUSEUM/

We also have the Festival of Sail every Labor Day Weekend (The U.S. Labor Day is celebrated on the first Monday in September). The Festival of Sail is sponsored by the San Diego Maritime Museum and is the largest gathering of Tall Ships on our West Coast!

We additionally have the San Salvador being built. The San Salvador was the explorer Juan Cabrillo's ship when he discovered San Diego Bay for Spain in 1542. This ship is being built with old time tools and methods...

[DanK]

Very well done. Your use of geometry is inspiring. And this whole series of photos has convinced me that I need to spend more of my time looking up

[Manfred M]

Very well done. Your use of geometry is inspiring. And this whole series of photos has convinced me that I need to spend more of my time looking up

In my case, I think it comes naturally. Some of my earliest memories are of my parents yelling at me to watch where I was walking instead of looking up at things around me.

Seriously though, I do force myself to look at things from a different perspective; up, down straight on, etc I find I can (and do) find interesting compositional possibilities when I do this. I often get disowned by my wife when she catches me lying down on the floor of an old building, as I try to get a shot of the ceiling.