Please share your immediate response to the image before reading the photographer’s intent (obscured text below) or other comments. The photographer seeks a genuinely unbiased first impression.
Questions to guide your feedback
It was a dreary morning, cloudy like it wants to rain, but no rain. Early winter, late fall, take your pick. The leaves were mostly gone from the trees. I was out for a bike ride with my camera just enjoying the hour after sunrise when few people are out and about. I rode by this location, saw the subject, turned my bike around, parked it and got my camera out.
Did you stop and think about what you are seeing?
Or
Did you immediately know what was going on?
Other Information
Please leave your feedback before viewing the blurred information below, once you have replied, click to reveal the text and see if your assessment aligns with the photographer. Remember, this if for their benefit to learn what your unbiased reaction is.
Technical Details
Taken with a Nikon Z7II with a Nikkor Z 24-120 f/4 S at 120 mm with the camera held high above my head. 1/1250 sec, f/4 ISO 1000.
This was a quick process in Lightroom, Reduced the highlights a fair amount, increased the shadows and whites a bit to add contrast. A tiny bit of increased saturation, though it was mostly grey so this didn’t do much. Cropped the top and bottom off and flipped the image upside down.
Critique Template
Use of the template is optional, but it can help spark ideas.
Vision and Purpose:
Conceptual:
Emotional Impact and Mood:
Composition:
Balance and Visual Weight:
Depth and Dimension:
Color:
Lighting:
Processing:
Technical:
Hi Paul,
To answer your question, I immediately knew I was looking at a stick/branch in water with a reflection. I hadn’t processed that it was flipped, or that it was barbed wire as well. But my first reaction was not “ how was this made?” It was more an interest in the zones of clear reflection, the wire and stick “in the sky” so to speak and the trees that clarify what we are seeing. And the lovely tones of the image.
Eager to see what others say. I like the image. It’s identifiable and curious at once.
ML
Very intriguing. Before trying to analyze it, I saw a thorny branch floating in air above the water. It appears now to be a vertically flipped image of a reflection and maybe a branch - not sure. The mystery makes it quite compelling.
I knew right away that I was seeing some object in water, probably because of the symmetry. Only a reflection does that. Beyond that, I was trying to figure out the context.
It didn’t take me long to figure it out, Paul, but I’ve played with this kind of stuff myself and someone posted a reflection image not long ago that probably helped trigger recognition. Regardless, it’s a very nice image.
Thank you all for your comments. I figured experience photographers would figure this out pretty quick. I did have a couple of people that had some very interesting looks on their face as they scanned the image. This was one of those times when it just happened real fast while I was out on a bicycle ride. Totally grey day and there wasn’t much to see until I came across this pond and the reflections.
Really well seen; very happy you found this and shared it. To answer your questions, I sorta got this this right away, but then had to slow down to appreciate the mirroring of the branch. The branch is other-worldly. The reflected trees (with the image cleverly inverted) bring the scene back to the world. I wonder what I would feel if no trees were present to being me back to the world.
Now I get to see the rest of the story …
