to me "AS FOUND" just means to me he didn't move anything.. except himself
and his camera...
My definition also.
I wasn't trying to defend Mark - his images speak for themselves.
I was just giving my opinion.
Kenneth Waller
http://www.pentaxphotogallery.com/kennethwaller
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ann Sanfedele" <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: PESO - As Found
to me "AS FOUND" just means to me he didn't move anything.. except himself
and his camera...
OTOH I don't think it would have been "dishonest" to photograph and show
this if he had nudged the leaf a bit to the right or left to improve the
composition - only _dishonest_ if he called it "as found"
Ken, I don't think anyone thought Mark didn't find it as shown - I hope my
joking comments didn't contribute to you feeling you had to defend him :-)
But I will say that when shooting closeups of flora in the wild I don't
think it is dishonest to remove a tiny twig, or flick away a seedling that
has fallen onto your subject.. bend back branches of a nearby shrub
to eliminate a shadow, etc. especially when you can't adjust your position
to capture the scene more artistically. Especially on a windy day, or a
rainy one, where the scene changes quickly anyway. It isn't
cheating.
And I agree with Darren vis a vis Eliot Porter - who was my inspiration
for any nature photos I shot in the early days... I've got all the
Sierra Club paperbacks and a few hardcovers of his, including his
wonderful black and white stuff of the southwest. Seeing his dye transfer
prints in person at.. the MET? or MOMA? in the 70's was
a great treat.
ann
On 10/14/2014 10:10, Ken Waller wrote:
It's quite one thing to arrange people in a wedding party and an entirely
different thing to arrange things in nature to suit your tastes. Doing
this in nature I'd say is dishonest IMO.
I've come across scenes in nature and photographed them 'as found'
numerous time - its really a matter of being alert and looking for them.
That said I believe that this image was 'as found' as Mark stated and the
colors look quite natural to me.
-----Original Message-----
From: Darren Addy <[email protected]>
Sent: Oct 14, 2014 9:14 AM
To: Pentax-Discuss Mail List <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: PESO - As Found
Just a couple other thoughts about this remarkable composition...
I think that Mark is being quite modest in calling this "As Found"
(and of course, attempting to derail any thoughts that he might have
arranged anything). Frankly, I wouldn't care if he had: Photography is
often in seeing the possibilities and presenting things (like people
at a wedding, for example) at their best. <derail>Anyone who has
photographed people professionally knows that if you do it passively -
photojournalist style - you aren't going to get the best results.
Small things like the amount and direction a head is tilted, or
providing something better to do with the clasped hands (fig leafs)
that people often automatically assume when a camera is pointed at
them, these things are "directorial" with the goal of presenting a
better (and, counter-intuitively, often a more natural-looking
photograph). Most still life images painted the masters was probably
not "as found" and I doubt that we care or give them bonus points for
never touching or adjusting anything within the composition.
Secondly, a composition on the ground, like this one, still did not
automatically create a good image. The photographer still had choices
to make. Even if one chooses to say that the "directly overhead" point
of view was a "no-brainer" there were choices that the photographer
had to make on how much of the scene to include or crop out. He also
has the choice of making it a horizontal or vertical composition (or
square, even). And he has the freedom to orient the camera in any one
of 360 degrees while pointing down. It would be an interesting
experiment to take a group of photographers and (without them seeing
the others had done) assign them to photograph this same patch of
ground. I doubt that any two of them are going to come away with the
exact same image of the scene.
Thirdly, after Tim Bray's comments I went back and looked at the image
again. I can see that the saturation might have been bumped a little
but I don't see this as a problem. It does not look unnatural to me,
although I realize that this is subjective and different photographers
may draw the line in different places. I normally look at the "white"
areas in an image to judge if the color cast is off in any direction
and the whites do not appear to have any sort of greenish cast to my
eyes.
In short, I really, really like everything about this image and I'm
quite glad that Mark's eyes were open to the possibility when it
presented itself.
On Tue, Oct 14, 2014 at 7:41 AM, Ann Sanfedele <[email protected]>
wrote:
fortunately it wasnt -exactly- under your feet :-)
That's one of those little scenes that no one is going to believe
you didn't create by moving the leaf into just the right place..
"... not that there's anything wrong with that.."
ann
On 10/13/2014 19:20, Mark C wrote:
http://www.markcassino.com/b2evolution/index.php/as-found
You never know what is going to be right under your feet.
Mark
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