The title, “October is my Favorite Color” pretty much sums up my feelings about autumn in New England. I have been chasing autumn color for over 25 years, and still enjoy the beauty of October. This year was very strange weather-wise. Record cold in mid-September created peak color in northern New England during the last week of September, almost 2 weeks earlier than normal. This was followed by warm weather in October that led to normal times for peak color in southern New England. By moving from north to south, I have been shooting peak color for 4 consecutive weeks now, and it should hold for another week.
In autumn, I normally find myself attracted to the grand landscape, and bodies of water, such as ponds, rivers, and waterfalls. A severe drought this summer dried up many bodies of water and waterfalls, essentially taking those subjects off the table. And due to Covid, I wanted to to avoid the larger than normal crowds of people getting outdoors at the overlooks and trails that I usually visit.
So this year I decided instead to concentrate my efforts on shooting intimate fall scenes in the woods. This image was taken on 10/13 near the Quabbin Reservoir in Massachusetts. Luckily the drought ended in time for October to have a number of rainy, overcast days, perfect conditions for shooting tree portraits. Red Maples are my favorite tree, but here I decided to use it as a frame rather than the main subject.
What artistic feedback would you like if any?
Any critique or comments are welcome
Pertinent technical details or techniques:
Canon 5D MKIV, Canon 70-200mm f4 lens, at 200mm, ISO 400, 1/15sec at f11
Ed, for me it’s always difficult to give a comment that makes sense. For this one and your story that goes with it. I can only see those beautiful colors and a nice composition, with the trees keeping my view in the image.
Fall colours are so hard to capture in a way that avoids cliche - the surface of the thing - but rather stirs in us deeper memories and feelings. Over the course of this fall I have been nose to nose with peak colour and have experienced that struggle - to take pictures about fall colour rather than of fall colour. I think you have done a great job here of laying out an almost abstract field of colour and texture that gets me to look a little more closely at what I think I already know. Personally I like the contrast in this picture, which gives the image more of an abstract feel and allows my imagination to make of the image as I will.
Pure perfection, Ed! Since Mother Nature threw you a curveball and dried out much of the bodies of water in New England; this makes for the perfect Plan B. On the plus side this will allow you to concentrate on expanding the portfolio. I am enjoying the swath of color from left to right with the reds, greens and yellows. This is a lovely intimate woodland scene.
These intimate scenes are so hard to compose, for me at least. In my view, you nailed this one. The juxtaposition of the reds and yellows, and the comp. with the red leaves on the left and the clump of yellow trees on the right is just right.
Matt I chose ISO 400 because it was raining and there was some wind, and I wanted a faster shutter speed to keep the leaves from blurring in the wind. As Kerry Gordon mentioned, I also view this image as kind of an abstract. I wanted the single leaves on the yellow tree to be reasonably sharp, as they create points of color that sort of remind me of paintings from the school of Pointillism (painting with dots).
Kerry, as we discussed in one of your own autumn color posts, photographing fall color is somewhat hard to do well if your goal is to create artistic images that are more than just walls of color. I thought the diagonal line at the interface of red and yellow created a little tension in the image, which made it less static. And I am glad that you see this image as somewhat of an abstract, since that was my intent when creating it. I love the way those single yellow leaves become points of color against the green background.
And Lyle, now you know why I’m obsessed with red maples. As I said in my PM to you on peak color, I’m a foliage snob and if the reds are gone it’s past peak as far I’m concerned…
Nice, Ed. Colors, processing, comp all excellent. These kinds of scenes are not easy, but you nailed it. Originally, I wondered about the placement of the trunks so far to the right, but then realized it was balanced out nicely with the “heavier” reds on the left.
And I’m also with you on the peak reds.
Since I don’t live in such an environment I can only guess at the difficulties involved. As with all woodland photography it’s hard to find the perfect combination of lines, shapes and colors for a good composition. It’s much easier to do so in the desert.
I like the colors here and how the individual leaves well defined, rather than blobs of color. For example, the branches on the tree on the right add variety and complexity to the composition.
In terms of balance - I feel the image is left heavy. The reds are dominating so much, especially at the edge of the left frame. I’m not sure if it’s the red color itself or it’s saturation. Anyway, I tried this crop which removes some of the red and also does so with the more saturated areas. Perhaps just a fainter hue of red is all that’s needed.
Fantastic image, @Ed_McGuirk! I thoroughly enjoy the red colors. Igor expressed concern they may be too dominant, but I think it works quite well. I also like the lichen on the tree on the left, with yellow-orange leaves. And the green patches, in-between, really accentuate the contrast of the colorful leaves.
I have two potential suggestions:
In order to create more contrast on the right side of the frame and balance out the weight, I might suggest saturating the lichen a bit more, so that there are additional points of interest on the right.
Near the center, just above the bottom of the frame, there is branch that connects the yellow-orange and green leaves on the left and the yellow-orange-red leaves on the right. I would suggest cloning that branch out, as it was distracting to my eye and may be to others. It also takes away from the symmetry, between the green patch the branch is contained within and the green patch mid-to-quarter way up the frame, IMHO.
Hi @Ed_McGuirk, fantastic shot as always. I love the arrangement of the colors in the frame.
It looks like a painting. Great image, thanks for sharing.
I agree Jimmy, that is a good idea to clone that branch away. I also agree with you about needing to add some more contrast on the right side, it will help balance the image, given how strong the reds are on the left.
@Igor_Doncov I also agree with you about a slight crop from the left, again to achieve an improvement in the “balance” of the image.
Here is a rework that reflects all of the suggestions everyone made. I also decided to crop a bit off the bottom when I cropped the left side, in order to maintain a 3:2 aspect ratio.
@Ed_McGuirk You started with a great image. Now, with the combined communal input and your new adjustments, the final image is fantastic. Everything came together quite well and the rework really sings. Well done!
This is beautiful Ed! The contrasting colors are the star of the show and you have composed them very nicely here. No nits from me!
Incidentally, October is my favorite color too…unless of course I’m in Colorado then it’s in Sepember (for most places anyway), or Utah then it’s November.
I am late to this party, but benefited from reading the conversation. I too was struck by the almost-abstract effect of the image. It is about the trees and foliage not of the trees, as you set out to do. I very much enjoy the right/left stoppers of the trunks and the red mass. One thing that caught my eye was the light pink in the red tree, as we see the lighter underside of some leaves. I liked it a better when I did a color range select and increased saturation and decreased lightness of those pink spots.
On the plus side this will allow you to concentrate on expanding the portfolio. I am enjoying the swath of color from left to right with the reds, greens and yellows. This is a lovely intimate woodland scene.
