Path Through the Greens
by paganini

Comment:
I do make allowance for his photo :) otherwise i would've given a 1 like most studio flower shots.... people like high impact images on DPC, you can't change that.

Originally posted by Journey: Left you a comment under Gordon's picture. Odd that you make allowances for the shortcomings in your own pictures (your yesterday's PM) but are unwilling to do so for those of others. My appraisal of dpc comments in general (and i stress the 'in general') is that they say a great deal more about the personality of the commenter than about the picture that they are allegedly giving feedback on.

Impressionist canvas
by Gordon

Comment:
Sure, it is a representation, but i just don't like it myself. That's all :) Maybe I am going for the Heidi Klum of nature, but is there anything wrong with that? I still give it much higher score than other staged studio flower shots :)

I doubt Gordon got this score because of the broken flowers -- that was my only comment, but i am sure people voted it down because of the shallow focus as well. Besides, this IS DPC -- you vote on the highest impact photo in the shortest amount of time you have to look at it. And nature shots in DPC is always the hardest to present.

FYI -- Heidi Klum in nature is also gonna be harder to photograph than Heidi Klum in studio :) She's also going to be harder to find too.

Originally posted by Journey: Paganini, hope you revisit this picture because i like to say that i radically disagree with your assessment. Of course, just like everyone else you are entirely entitled to your own opinion :) Don't know why i even say that because of all people you don't need reminding of that ;) You object that the focus flower has broken stems (petals?). But you know what? That's NATURE. I like to see nature not an ANTI-SEPTIC man-made 100% perfect rendition of it to suit a photograph glossy. I like to see the 'flaw', the 'oddity' in nature because despite that whatever is real nature always happens to be incredibly harmonious. Nature really is the master artist of all. Judging from your voting comment, what you are after, paganini, is a Hollywood, Heidi Klum version of nature. (glad i could toss this in :) But real nature is so much more beautiful and interesting than the made-over Heidi Klums. Total perfection ends up being BORING. The reason i like this image so much is because the focus flower(s) is (are)in focus but just barely, just barely, just barely, and hence it blends in so harmoniously with the shallow dof other flowers.

Message edited by author 2003-05-21 15:42:54.

Path Through the Greens
by paganini

Comment:
Thanks guys for your wonderful comments :)

To answer some questions: it's really difficult to photograph a forest or trees when the light is harsh, it creates too much contrast that you can expose for one or another. Thus it's best to photograph when it's cloudy or during sunset/sunrise. As far as the wow factor -- i know this photograph wouldn't do well because it's GREEN, and I have others that i have shot for America24-7 that would've done a lot better (orange sunset with sillhouettes) but i am submitting those so i am not going to post it on here for now.

Green Reflection
by nightowl

Comment:
lighting is wayyyyy too harsh

Orange Green and Purple
by sg10

Comment:
Must you announce all the colors in your title?

Lila Fascination
by Ilona57

Comment:
not bad for a flower shot.

Evening Star (Oranges and Purples in the Sky and Ocean)
by loz1

Comment:
if you can shorten the top of the sky, it'd be a nicer image IMHO. 6

Van Gogh's Plate
by labrynthe

Comment:
looks like someone vomit over the page.....

Butterfly Fantasy
by dsidwell

Comment:
I am simply questioning the integrity of a shot that is nature-like. I mean, most of the people who voted thought it was real probably, had they know it wasn't, the results would be much different. Then there is that ethics question of shooting nature photographs and present it as a nature photograph even though it's fake. How would someone like it if National Geographic prints out a photograph of a snow leopard (very difficult to find) and it was simply a cut and paste from a previous photograph? People would be pissed. It's just ethics. If these were three REAL butterflies with increased saturation, that's one thing.

Butterfly Fantasy
by dsidwell

Comment:
I knew these were fake butterfly, hence the 2 vote, you can tell by looking at the perfect colors of the butterfly wings, which doesn't happen in nature, also the edges of the wings, looks like it's CUT from paper.

We already have what, a ton of photos with hue adjustments and shifted colors FOR NATURE shots (which i consider blasphemous), but this one is worse. It's just like spot editing an image by inserting elements that weren't there before. I don't care for other shots, but for nature shots I'd expect real photographs, not fake ones.