Please share your first response before reading the hidden notes below. The photographer is looking for an unbiased initial impression.
Feedback Focus: Artistic / Expressive
Questions for Viewers
What do you see?
About This Image
I’m starting a new project, cooking up ideas, adding ingredients to see if it works. The title is as straightforward as it gets.
This image was taken at the local beach at sunset, working with the reflections of the sky on the “moving water.” This shot was taken toward the end of the session, when the color had already passed its peak and there wasn’t much movement in the water, but I liked this effect.
I’m not sure what I’m seeing in this one, Joao. It could be water and rather muddy shore or it could be an old sheet of metal with some interesting rust patterns. Or it could be something I’m just not imagining. I do find the patterns interesting in the way the fine details fill most of it and then there’s the pretty much solid band of brown near the top that more or less stops the flow in that direction.
Now I’ll go read the blurred out section to see how far off I was. Well, water right. The reflections had me fooled.
I am guessing this abstract scene is a continuation of your impression series excluding the sun and sky. The alternating bands of warm and cool colors works quite well; especially those two narrow ones along the top edge of the frame. It’s not to noticeable in the smaller image, but when I opened the larger one I did find myself wishing for more DOF as the bottom edge is a little OOF. Just my opinion of course as that may have been your intent. Off to check the blurred out area.
I love this kind of abstraction, Joao, and this is not exception. The colors work beautifully, and while it feels like a landscape reinterpreted, I can also see Dennis’ impression of metal with pitting and oxidation.
I wonder also about the dof. It feels as though it’s intentionally in the middle of the image, and I can’t remember your #1 image in the series and whether you did something similar there. It does pull my eye when looking full size (not at all on my phone, just on PC at full size), so I wonder what it would feel like to look at it as a big print on a wall.
More on your thoughts about the dof might help us understand its function. It’s abstract, so it shouldn’t matter, and yet, if it does distract, it might be worth thinking through the intent there.
