Last year on on 4/18/20, Massachusetts experienced an unusually late April snowstorm with some decent accumulation. This was the first time I ever experienced snow while the trees were starting to bud out in their spring colors. It was early enough in the season that there were not many trees around which had started to bud out, but I was lucky enough to find this red maple. The background was nothing special, so I just zoomed in to fill the frame with the buds on the tree. This was the first photo session I enjoyed after going into Covid lockdown in early March 2020. And spring emerging despite the snowfall gave me my first sense of optimism since the start of the pandemic.
Specific Feedback Requested
any critique or comments are welcome
Technical Details
Is this a composite: No
Canon 5D MK4, Canon 70-200mm f4 lens, at 200 mm, ISO 400, 1/80 sec at f11
I remember this lovely image from your website, Ed. The way you filled the frame with with the snow covered emerging spring leaves of the maple is perfect IMO. I also think the red of the leaves along with the white of the snow makes for a wonderful color combination. This may sound crazy because it is a springtime image, but I think this would make an excellent Christmas card. Anyway, this is a beautiful scene!
Striking image, Ed. Your composition is spot on, and I especially like where you stopped at the bottom. Stopping there, versus allowing the tree trunk the go further down, allowed the bottom left & right to stay full and colorful. Beautiful image!
I wondered how it would look if the flowers were brighter so I downloaded it and played. The color of the flowers in your rendition looks more accurate than my revised version, but I just wanted to see the difference.
Absolutely gorgeous image, Ed. I would be inclined to brighten the snow just a little (I used a Lights 4 mask) just to give it a touch more contrast and pop, but minor stuff. I really like this one.
Very nice Ed. I love the red & white color palette, and the content is pretty unique.
The processing looks good to me and the composition is just perfect. Nothing should be cropped out, and I’m not wishing to see any more of the scene.
I saw on the news this morning that there’s snow potential in the Berkshires tomorrow and Friday, so maybe there will be more opportunity for images like this. Not sure how the trees are progressing uo there, but they’re all budding here in CT.
Very nice, Ed. You’re developing a very sophisticated eye for capturing fractal patterning. The colours are wonderful but in this kind of picture, it’s the trunk that grounds it, giving the chaos, structure. Two thumbs up.
Thank you for taking the time to comment on my image, I appreciate your input.
Ed Lowe, you are right that would make for great Christmas card. Bill, I like what you did directionally with increasing the luminosty, I may rework it to aim for something in-between yours and my version.
The pandemic has forced me to shoot close to home, and away from other people. And that mostly means trees, trees and more trees. I have gotten much better at tree photography as a result, but I’m kind of itching to shoot some grand landscapes again. I hope things settle down enough in the second half of this year that it will be possible to safely do so.
Craig, I’ve been keeping an eye of this too. In eastern Mass, only a few of our trees have just barely begun to bud out, and our forecast is for rain only. I briefly thought about trying to go further south to SW Mass or NW CT to chase the snow on Friday, but I’m scheduled for my second vaccine dose on Friday and really can’t take the time to travel that far. I hope you have some good luck with it if you get some decent snow.
A really beautiful image Ed … nothing to change IMHO. The contrast of the red maple leaves with the snow really makes this image … and the fact that there’s no sky or ground to detract.
