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’s been a long (way lo long) time since I post here. I decide to get back to the University and get myself an Arts Degree. It was very time consuming, somehow not that difficult, but it’s finally over after three years in the making.
Anyway;
Last sunday took some time to a long walk, and had the opportunity to get some photos.
This one stand from the others
What do you feel?
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.
Image Description
Had to way a very long time to get the sun in the position, actually waiting for a cloud to obscure the scene.
Technical Details
It took me some time to manage to “tame” the highlights on the scene.
Critique Template
Use of the template is optional, but it can help spark ideas.
Joao, You were well rooted when you made this image. The composition works fine to me. The tree foliage at the top adds to the frame at sets off the roots that are otherwise pretty bland. The reflection in the water and number of roots suggests that this is a huge tree. What is the story that the roots or tree tell to you? Perhaps the image calls out for saving the rainforest. You must have been in a boat on the river when you made this. Nice image.
My reaction is that there is a struggle going on. Lots of pushing and shoving.
Initially I liked the green on top but after scroll cropping I think it’s better without it. The green gives a sense of what it is - mangroves. With it the picture is about what it could be. That’s just my take on it.
Hi João - welcome back and congratulations on your degree!
I feel a lot of tension in this, of a great struggle. The roots themselves feel as if they’re in a competition, and your tight framing doesn’t give them a lot of room for that competition.
I’m with Igor on the green bits - they feel a bit distracting. Our natural inclination is to be drawn to green things. And the cheery bright green contrasts with the story I see in the roots. Maybe that’s a good thing, though. I’m just not sure, I guess.
I agree about the leaves. Don’t cut the composition that is splendid but just cloning at least those leaves in the middle part and closest to the observer; but all is better. I thing that with photo you have honored your recent Arts Degree, without the leaves the image seems to me a modern work of art. Beautiful.
Conceptual: To me this image tells an elementary story about life: Water (bottom), roots absorbing water (middle), and growth (top).
Composition: The horisontal format combined with the myriad of roots and the size of the green leaves gives me an impression of scale. The half bottom of the image is partly a reflection of the roots in the water, partly a blurred foreground that I cannot identify (vegetation in the foreground?), and which may not strengthen the image; the reflections in water are visually interesting themselves, but they compete with the blurred foreground. Suggestion: If the image had been captured from a higher angle, the reflection in water could take up more space in the frame, and the blurred foreground could have been avoided. Would that be an improvement?
Color: The hue of the green leaves appear to me somehow disintegrated compared to the color of the roots. Perhaps the green leaves are too green? Or reversely, would it be possible to underline one of the colors in the roots?
Light: There are a few beams of soft light on some of the roots near the water. Would it be worthwhile using a longer focus length, crop in, and make this light central?
João, this is quite dramatic. The tangled roots and their reflections feel like a Dali painting or maybe a scene from Lord of the Rings. While I like the contrast with the green leaves at the top, cropping so that it’s only roots and reflections emphasizes the fantasy struggle or “marching roots” feeling.
Actually, on second look, this image is perfect as it is. Excellent work. Bravo! Imaginitive, mysterious, expressive. It has everything you could ask for.
