James, There are many people on this list who are excellent photographers, and many like yourself who discount their own abilities. Most of the images posted here are designed to illustrate the posts and document the trees and places they have seen. This is an appropriate choice of the use of photography in this context. There is less of a focus on photography as an art. A photographer has a set of tools to use when creating an image - and I am not talking about his camera. He has choices to make and these choices are the real tools in the art of photography. these are what makes the difference between an average image and a great one. He can choose how to frame an image, overall composition, how to deal with light, brightness, shadow, and color temperature, depth in the image, color or lack of color in the image, patterns in the image, and textures of objects in the image. He can choose how to combine multiple images into a single one.
If there is a fantastic scene anyone can snap a good photograph. However, that is not what makes a great photograph. If you have a grand scene, one goal is to try to capture the grandeur of the scene, the power that you are seeing. If the image doesn't accomplish that ideal, it may still be nice picture, but in some ways it is a failure. A photo of the Grand Canyon doesn't just need to be in focus, it needs to be "Grand." An image of an old growth forest doesn't just need to be lit properly, it needs to capture the "primordial feel" of age. You need to capture to power of the scene to be a true success. The other end of the spectrum deals with smaller vignettes of a scene. What these need to show are the pieces of the broader scene that tell a story in and of themselves. They need to capture not the power, but the "soul" of scene being photographed. Flowers sprouting from a burned log, for example might illustrate the cycle of fire death and rebirth in a forest. One final consideration is how to capture the essence of nature in the mundane setting of forests that have been cut over and over again. This is a challenge faced by us in many trips to the forest and the real test of how good of an eye you have for photography. I think if a photographer is trying to achieve an artistic success, they must try to capture both the grandeur and soul of a scenes in a portfolio of images, rather than simply collecting a series of pretty images. Ed "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both. " Robert Frost (1874-1963). Mountain Interval. 1920. ----- Original Message ----- From: James Parton To: ENTSTrees Sent: Friday, November 14, 2008 1:23 PM Subject: [ENTS] Re: Desktop - wallpaper Ed, Thanks for the compliment. Photography is just a hobby for me. Both Jarrid & Miles both easily exceed my abilities. James P. On Nov 14, 1:05 pm, "Edward Frank" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Ents, > > James Parton has uploaded a very nice autumn photo of maidenhair Gingko and willow oak leaves to the files page of the Google Groups site: > > Maidenhair+Autumn.JPG > > http://entstrees.googlegroups.com/web/Maidenhair+Autumn.JPG?hl=en&gda... > > If this link doesn't work, just go to the Google sitehttp://groups.google.com/group/entstrees?hl=enand look for it under the Files section. > > The file is 1440 x 957 pixels in size (1.4 MB) so it is large enough for most screens and sharp. > > Ed Frank > > "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both. " > Robert Frost (1874-1963). Mountain Interval. 1920. > > Maidenhair+Autumn_sm.jpg > 27KViewDownload --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Eastern Native Tree Society http://www.nativetreesociety.org You are subscribed to the Google Groups "ENTSTrees" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/entstrees?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
