Alyosha, my greatest critic, gave the green light on this so I’m posting it.
What is it about? I don’t know. I didn’t even know why I liked it when I shot it. I was exploring old cedar stumps and this brighter section of one stump just jumped out and drew my attention. When I finally saw it on the screen I liked it even more. But I have to admit thinking “What are they going to think when they see this?”. But my son confirmed that there is something to this creation of mine so I’m posting it. Hope you like it. Let me know what you think.
GFX50R, 45-100mm@100mm, ISO 100, CPL, tripod, focus stacked, etc
I’m admittedly somewhat of a simpleton when it comes to appreciating the deeper meanings of what art is about. I very much appreciate it when I do get it, but I’m also very happy to look at an image and feel the emotion or pleasure of it (happy, intrigued, peaceful, etc.). “Liking” the images I take trumps the other stuff for me personally, whether I find a deeper meaning or not.
I do like this one. I think it would be an easy one to skim over, which would be a mistake because a lot of the interest for me is the way all the details come together. I enjoy the colors and texture of the wood, the lichen randomly sprinkled around, the nice counterpoint of the plant on the right, and especially the spider webs. It all joins as a pleasant mix.
I immediately see a face. I can’t unsee the face and I think that is hampering my ability to appreciate this image for the textures, colors, depth, and lines that are abundant. I see the lion in the wizard of oz with a dark mane around a golden head, 2 eyes and a nose and a mouth. I know that’s not what you wanted me to see but it sort of jumped out at me. I can certainly see why you were drawn to this though. I might lighten the section in the bottom of the image that is dark under the center section that is lighter, but not much. I’m going to come back to this and give it another try and see if I see something different tomorrow.
When I first saw this image on the overview page I just wondered, what is this. But when you take the time to open the image on a larger screen and look at the details the image is in fact very interesting to study. I addition to the face that everyone sees in which ever form (for me its a pig or a wild boar at the upper part) it could be seen as a shield.
Igor, I enjoyed your image. It has a certain impressionistic quality to me. The patterns and earth tones work well together. There is a splash of green in the lichen and leaves that I also liked.
I’m a me-too on this one also - I like it! Great find and glad you decided to share it.
One of my first thoughts was when I tried turning my head to make it a horizontal… so I did. The other minor tweak was to darken the brighter elements around the outer edge to keep emphasis on the central subject matter. Also added a slight vignette for the same reason.
Love the texture and detail, but the presence of the plant interacting with the lichen covered face of the log makes a great nature story.
Beautifully seen and captured. Oh, and curious on the original orientation. I’m assuming this was a vertical subject originally? Or did you rotate? But that’s really not important to know.
@Lon_Overacker, first of all I would like to express my admiration for taking this on and modifying it. It makes perfect sense to place the plants on the bottom moving upwards since that’s how they grow. It’s an image that makes little sense and what little there is is in the plant.
I recently watched a video of the introduction of modern art in the United States (around WWI, I believe). It wasn’t well received by neither the critics nor the public. But there was a review in the Boston newspaper that was particularly funny. It included a set of drawings of people’s reaction to the exhibit. The one that was particularly funny was of a man standing on his head with his feet up in the air trying to make sense of what he was looking at.
