A couple of weeks ago, my wife and I spent three glorious days about three hours north of Toronto. The last day we were there, I went for my morning photo walk on the neighbour’s property. He has cut a vast network of trails through hundreds of acres of forest. About an hour after sunrise, deep in the forest, I came upon this open glade. Everything around was in shadow but there was this light, glowing like a soft spotlight shining down just on the red leaves on the ground. The first thing that popped into my head was – this is a Faerie Glade – I could practically see them dancing around the circle of light. It was very hard to figure out a way the make this image in the way I experienced it. The RAW image suggests it, but it took me a bit of playing around to get to this, which is pretty close to what I experienced.
I like the colour contrast between the reds and greens here Kerry. The vignette works well for me and there is enough of the forest to provide context and accompaniment to the stunning leaves.
Good job Kerry! This is one of your recent best images. It’s a ‘more than a rock’ type of image and that’s something many of us try to achieve and not often do.
This spooky place almost as if it is on fire, Still , beautiful light against the dark forest. an image where one can build his own story. Fine work, Kerry.
What a scene to happen upon. Just gorgeous. I think of faerie glades as being more gentle, even if they’re dark. In that vein, the darks here feel harsh to me. That’s just me, though, if this conveys your vision.
Now that I’m seeing this on a bigger screen I would suggest cropping out the dark tree on the left and those on the right, but especially the left one. I feel they complicate the message. The statement is simpler without them. Just my opinion, YMMV.
@Bonnie_Lampley. The common picture of faeries is that they are like little sugar plum children, sweetly flying around delightfully sprinkling faerie dust here and there. This is mostly to do, I think, with Disney and how he and his studio tended to sanitize everything they got their hands on. In indigenous cultures, faeries and sprites are regarded as elemental beings of power which can sometimes seem capricious but always due utmost respect. I think also of Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”. Oberon and Titania were hardly sugar plums. They were powerful beings and woe betide the fool who crossed them. This is more my sense of faeries and what came to mind when I came across this glade - that I would do well to approach it with reverence and respect. So, yes, a little on the “spooky” side as @Ben_van_der_Sande would have it .
@Igor_Doncov I appreciate your coming back around for a second look. I had actually tried a tighter crop in post, more or less as you suggested and I found that it opened up the picture, giving it more of a sense of spaciousness. That isn’t what I was after. With the trees on either side (implying more of ring), it feels - to me anyway - more claustrophobic, which is much more the feeling I want to convey.
The light makes this image. I really like it. The moodiness of it really gives the feeling of the deep woods. Well seen and photographed.
Beautiful light, color and directed emphasis on the leaves. Very well constructed and very effective. I quite like it.
Very interesting, Kerry. I am not sure how I feel about the light play because it seems like a very harsh vignette at first. But for what it’s worth, I keep looking at the image and a lot more comes to the front that distract my mind from the vignette: The subtle pull to go deeper into the forest, the tree arrangement in the background, even the chopped off logs. They are quite captivating. I must confess that there is a tug in my mind asking why are the leaves on the ground red when the leaves on the trees have not yet changed color?
Kerry, this is such an eye-catching, beautiful scene! I love the dark, rich reds and surrounding greens. Perfect title. Thanks for sharing.
On the other hand Adhika, why would there be green leaves spread along the ground? That seems even more unlikely.
@Igor_Doncov, I thought the green leaves on the ground are actually attached to the smaller trees. I think I can make out their small trunks on some of them.
Perhaps I didn’t make my point well. Your well taken point is that how could there be red leaves on the ground with green leaves all around. Where did they come from? My point was the opposite point. How could one expect all those red leaves on the ground to be green? Green leaves don’t fall off trees. So the leaves on the ground must be the correct coloration.
Personally I believe that all the colors are as they were even though they don’t make sense. It is a head scratcher for sure.
@Igor_Doncov, @Adhika_Lie - Gentlemen, I’m impressed by the deep philosophical questions that are arising out of this picture. That being said, you are not accounting for the much taller trees that surround the smaller ones but are not seen because of the POV from which this picture was taken.
Kerry - very interesting shot here. I didn’t mind the framing trees on the L and R side. I will say that the colors and light are very captivating at first glance. The cut birch tree is a distraction to my eye to the main show - the dance floor. Yet, I can see it may tell a different story.