* Wednesday C&C "No Theme" Thread #838 / Revived #058 on 2024 05 08 *

Welcome to the Wednesday Comments and Critique (No Theme & No Brand) thread!

We are dedicated to continuing the great tradition of this C&C thread because we are convinced that looking at, and talking about images is vital for better photography.

Our tried and tested concept (15 years and running!) is a weekly "peer-to-peer" photo comments & critique encounter, in which you GIVE and RECEIVE.

The idea is simple: you post an image and get critique on it, and in return give other people your opinion of their images, or vice versa.

Any Theme, Any Camera, Any Style, Any Subject.

We are still figuring out how to create the convenience of threaded view on this new forum.

For now, let us agree that you post an image with a title and short explanation, and that all comments include the image as a quote.
Replies to comments may or may not include quotes.

THREAD GUIDELINES – THE SHORT & SWEET VERSION
• This thread does not care about brands. It’s not about the tool, but the image.
• Post one image that you would like to get comments on (exceptions: see below).
• Add a clear title to your post to reflect the image’s title and distinguish your entry.
• Look at the other images and give your comments on at least one of those.
• For comments, try to go beyond a simple pat on the back or a short dismissal.
• Do you like an image (or essay) ? Try to explain WHY it appeals to you.
• Negative feedback is OK (we all want to learn), but be polite and constructive.
Try to explain why the image (or essay) does not appeal to you and how it might be improved.

We will start with single images.
Re-establishing our C&C for essays will be a next step.
Please limit any individual contribution to a single image. This avoids confusion.

The critique you give is vital.
What was your first impression? What catches your eye about an image? Why?
What do you like, and what distracts you? What would you change?

Fiddle with the image in your head - composition, perspective, color balance, exposure.

PLEASE NOTE CLEARLY:
It is understood that unless the original poster specifically states that they do not want an altered image posted that you are free to alter the posted image and repost it in a reply for C&C purposes (no use for other purposes!). That reposted image may remain permanently or you may remove it after a short period of time if you prefer. No copyright disputes here!

Encourage - it is a scary business putting your work up for other people to judge!

More general feedback is also welcome.
Do you know something about taking the same sort of image that would make matters easier - share your own as an example in your reply.

And finally, here are some useful hints for navigating and familiarizing yourself with the forum mechanics of DPRevived:
• Unfortunately, there is no threaded view (yet). We can’t simply keep images and their related comments together like we used to. So please make clear about which image you are commenting.
• To do that, you may make good use of the “quote” feature. This allows you to keep the image in your reply. Excess content can be deleted. The “preview” button allows you to look at what you are going to post.
• There is a difference between the “reply” button that sits at the top of the forum, and the reply buttons under every post.
• A few threads in this new forum with useful navigation information:
dprevived.com/t/how-to-use-this-site/387/
and
dprevived.com/t/how-to-embed-photos-into-your-post-directly-from-flickr/456/
(this applies also, with modifications, to other photo hosting websites)
and
dprevived.com/t/how-to-quote/1014/
Have fun and let’s stick together!

BACK DOWN TOWARDS LOCH MUICK

Recently returned from our fifth bi-annual Scotland hiking tour, I have not yet had the opportunity to look through the harvest of images made with my Oly E-M1 and Pany GM-5 cameras (the E-M1 used with biggish lenses on relatively flat hikes or when rain was threatening; the GM-5 with smaller lighter lenses on the hikes with more elevation).

So you will have to forgive me for uploading an Iphone image (Iphone 11Pro, by now almost a veteran).

We did quite a few challenging hikes during our stay (10 hikes of various length over 13 days) but were mostly blessed with good weather. Attacking Ben Lawers, the Tarmachan Ridge, CairnGorm and the Northern Corries covered in snow, etc, is a real joy if you can do it under a sky with sun and some photogenic fluffy clouds.

A hike we had to cut short, was the one from Loch Muick up towards Lochnagar and back down again.
Although : cut short is not really the right expression because actually the hike got longer than intended.
Starting at Spittal of Glen Muick with cloud cover and just a few optimistic forecasts of better weather on the way, we decided to attack the (normally circular) hike clockwise, starting first along Loch Muick for 4 kilometers before starting ascent.
By going uphill later than with the anti-clockwise normal route, we were hoping that the weather would clear to give us some views up top.

This was not to be.

We had quite some rain and cloud cover all the way up, with temperatures well below freezing and almost zero visibility on the last kilometers.
Having warmed ourselves a bit with tea and shortbread (but still with wet and utterly cold hands) at the Cairn (Carg Mor?) on the sub-summit, we decided to NOT do the final little bit to the actual summit of Lochnagar, but head down immediately.

There was no point in going further to a summit just to "bag that Munro", with zero visibility waiting for us and strong gusts of wind making the steepest part of the ascent even harder. With my cold hands in wet gloves I was barely able to hold my hiking poles and the rest of us were not much better.
Holding a camera was out of the question. I had to warm my hands by taking off my gloves and using a spare pair of woollen socks as mittens.

Unfortunately, the clouds and fog did not allow us to identify the path leading further clockwise and we knew that we would be walking along the edge of a cliff towards a small Lochan (between Lochnagar and Meickle Pap), so it seemed too dangerous to continue along that normal route.
.
So instead we decided to trace our own tracks back down like we had come.
This turned the 19K hike into a 26K hike, because we had taken the longer way around and up.

Mercifully, the air cleared on the way back down and this was a blessing, because it allowed us to enjoy the views on that stretch, that had been shrouded before.
Especially the river on the plateau and the majestic Glass Alt waterfalls were a treat, with Loch Muick welcoming us back in the far distance.

Here is a view from that stretch, with Loch Muick still several hundred meters below, our path on the right and the foaming water just above the waterfall on our left. Zoom in and you will see the blue jackets of a few of us.

The Legend and the Trial.

In the State Library of Victoria.
The armour worn by Ned Kelly when he was captured. Behind the armour is a sketch of Kelly in the dock at his trial.
If you don't know the Kelly story, it is worth following up. The police didn't play fair at the Siege of Glenrowan- they shot him in the legs.

I've seen that remarkable piece of (heavy) DIY armour when we visited the Melbourne Library.
You made good use here of the reflection to create an angle that links the actual armour with the sketch of the trial.

On a tangent :

For those interested in Ned Kelly: there are a couple of movies about him too.
The most recent I saw was a quite disturbing interpretation that I found weird and actually not that very good:
"The True History of the Kelly Gang" with George McKay (2019) directed by Justin Kurzel
(whose "Macbeth" I appreciated more, although it shares some of the weirdness).

There must be other, more "realistic" movies.

The movie that hit me most in the gut on Australian outlaws and their encounters with brutal law, is "The Proposition".
Its violence can be hard to stomach, but it is a great movie with superb acting.

Drafting Triangles

On my sketch pad.

Rich

A Little Escape Story Illustrated With Photos Of the Backsides of the Characters (no great photography, sorry)

Over the weekend I was photographing the state Great American Cleanup event which was sponsored by the environmental group I'm involved with (same people I worked with on the dam bird project). I stumbled on a small story that was more dramatic than the trash pickup and tree planting.

It started when I drove to my 7th site and found this volunteer sitting cross-legged on the ground staring at a rock. I walked over to be sure he wasn't ill.

He told me he'd found some little ducklings in an open hole from an abandoned sewer. He couldn't reach them with his arms, but was luring them into direct view with grass seeds and plucking them out one by one with the trash picker.

Once he got them out though, the local geese began trying to kill them. Another volunteer and a fisherman began blocking the geese to deter them and let the ducklings get to the water. They made a hasty dive off the pier, with the geese in pursuit.

The last duckling was finally hauled out. By then all the fishermen had gathered and a police officer had joined the effort.

The last duckling made his way to the shore before the goose caught him, and joined his siblings in the water. They made it across to the other side, where the red-shirted fisherman said he'd seen the parents take two ducklings earlier in the morning. Apparently they had left with who they could get. The group worked together to close the troublesome hole.

Steel Steps

I don't thik this one needs any introduction!

Pete

Nicely done. I like "industrial" abstracts.

Imagine how treacherous these are wet?!

Rich

It makes my knees ache. The river, the path, the V cleft. It all takes us downwards and a long way downwards it is. Three cheers for cellphone cameras.
Another cheer for the positioning of the rocks lower right and the near matching rock in the river. together they visually anchor the shot while also making it clear that this is no sidewalk stroll.

I'm gratified that the reflection was approvingly noted. Actually there were a lot of reflections across the glass cabinet. I spent quite a bit of time taking the edge off them and decided to leave the one you noted for just that reason.
The Kelly films have never done the man and the story justice. There is plenty of evidence that Ned was brave, heroic and became an outlaw with some justification. The armour was the inspired touch in the making of the legend.

Love it.
Including some design work along with the triangle is very cool. The placement of the sketch with its lines moving to the intersection of the triangle base beautifully links drawing with the tool.
Despite all the colour and weight angled across the top, it still feels balanced on the intersecting diagonal lines at the base.
It's almost a panorama in format and this is unusual and striking for a close up of a relatively small subject. The large dark triangular shadowed area across the top still feels fine. The dark detail of the spiral binding may be small but it balances the top shadow area effctively.

"Heartwarming." It's an overused word but I can't think of one better. The heartstrings get plucked by the ducklings themselves, the care of the first man, the pleasure in the joint human response and the addition of "the law." The images tell the stages of the story, complete with the bad guys with outstretched and threatening necks. And a final close up of a successful departure.
I feel better for looking at these and I can't say the same for newspapers.

Just as Rich has said.

A further response- my first was written in a hurry. The subject is instantly recognizable. The photographer insists that we look closer and appreciate the patterns and shading in front of us. Beautifully exposed to run the gamut of whites to blacks without losing details.
Outstanding.

The landscape is dramatic and beautiful, and there is a clear idea of the descent needed to reach the level of the water and, presumably, the car, the town, the hotel etc. There are a couple of useful items in the image, which underline that. Firstly the streamrunning from the foreground, and we know it will sooer or later end up in that loch. The other is the transition from the warm golden foreground to the colder, bluer, more distant background.

I like it!

Pete

I will add another voice of appreciation for the reflected court looking at the armour. the lawyers in disbelief and Ned ruefully wishing he'd had the time or forethought to add leg-guards. It is certainly an awe-inspiring construction, and we can only imagine the terror felt by the police when this lurched towards them, matched possibly by Ned's as he presented himself as an ungainly target to the barrage and hoped it would protect him.
In any case your photo is nicely done and thought-provoking.

Pete

I can agree with everything Mike has written. I will just add I enjoy the contrast between the almost psychedelic top left, with its colours and swirls, against the sober, well-designed black and white in the lower right. You have also judged the slow roll-off of focus nicely, so that it emphasises the line where these two "worlds" meet, and the rest slowly blurs, without the viewer feeling detail is missing.

Pete

It is a lovely story with cute leading characters, and the photos add to the text very well to tell it.
None of the photos would be exceptional on their own, but they go to show the transforming power of grouping them and adding words.

Pete