I'm back on Beaver Island, and have spent the past two days getting photos organized and doing some processing, as I worked to catch up on commenting and get up to date with posting. It was useful to have so much to go through as (a) mosquitoes are still here in full force making it the hot topic of conversation AND making it hard to get outside, and (b) I had a run-in with a nightstand in Chicago as I was packing on my overnight there, breaking two toes so keeping foot elevated was useful.
This photo is from the Meiji Imperial Gardens, in Tokyo, Japan but I'm posting it in celebration of the over 15 buds that have appeared on my irises here on Beaver Island this year -- a major victory in my challenge to have them bloom. Very exciting as in the past 8 years, I may be lucky to have 3 or 4 blooms. These should start blooming in the next week.
I've enjoyed getting caught up and will continue to work backwards to see the photos I've missed. And in another few days will turn my attention to photographing on the island. Thanks for your patience with the emphasis on the Japan trip.
To see the context for where this shot was taken, go to Michael's image at: http://365project.org/vankrey/or-this-one/2014-06-16
Wonderful to return from your fantastic trip to Japan and to Beaver Island to relax and analyze your beautiful pictures. This one is great and stylish.
Such a beautiful capture! The light is perfect and the black background really sets off the iris. Keep that foot up! Best place is inside with all those mozzies! Fav!
Fascinating image and great POV. Love how the stem has virtually disappeared. Hope the toes get better quickly. I've loved the shots from Japan. An ex pupil of mine lives and works there and I've been fascinated by the shots on his Facebook page, so no apologies needed. The culture and people are fascinating and now I know the buildings are too!
Technically a great capture with strong colour, fantastic exposure and lots of negative space. I love how you have kept the stem just visible. Much processing done here, Taffy?
@ericdibosco HI Eric....for this one the only processing I did was to raise the contrast and a little bit of the definition. It was one of those that simply 'told me' what it needed, if that makes sense.
@pamknowler@888rachel@newbank@sullivar
Ruth (Newbank Lass): @newbank
Pam (Pam Knowler): @pamknowler
Rachel @888rachel
Ryan Sullivan @sullivar
Hi Pam, Rachel, Ryan, and Ruth. Pam reminded me that our mentoring group was going to start up this week and I'm wondering if you are all still interested. Just as a reminder, we had left it that we would choose a theme for something we were interested in working on together -- a style, a form of editing, etc. and then learn together through comment and critique. I had started getting us organized and thought that it might make sense to create an email group to start with as it will be easier to keep track and archive our activities that way, but then post our photos and do our commenting online at 365. We also had agreed to put in our commentary something like "for critique group" so that our friends and followers don't inadvertently think we are being too harsh with each other because we would offer critique or ask questions about our thinking. If this makes sense to you, let's start a discussion off-line to determine our theme this week. I'm quite open...some ideas to start with might be: (a) black and white, (b) HDR processing, (c) macro (since that is a theme starting today), (d) structures, etc. My email address is: teraphael@gmail.com. Once we are all connected via email, we can use that to decide on our focus and how long (a month with a certain day a week to post and comment?). I'm looking forward to getting started.
Here's a summary of where we left in before I left for Japan: @pamknowler@888rachel@sullivar@newbank Hi Ruth, Ryan, Pam, and Rachel. Very long response…but wasn’t sure how else to do this… I'm quite flattered that you'd think I could help you and am happy to volunteer to be a mentor to the three of you. A few ideas of how we could make this a fun and useful experience…
Thought 1. What about if each of us agrees to look at one another's photos and make constructive comments/observations. I could 'model' the kinds of comments and observation that I think might be useful. We could focus on what worked and why, for example, rather than simply saying something is beautiful, etc. We could also point out areas that, if we were going to work on the photo, we would want to address (e.g., a critical friend looked at a recent photo I’d posted on flicker and noted that the white of the sky didn’t add anything, and suggested I darken the sky to bring out the clouds more. This is a very helpful comment – even if in this case, I’m not sure I can figure out how to do it). That way, each of us would have three other people pushing our thinking about our photos. Looking critical at someone else’s photo also helps me think about my own.
Thought 2. Another thought is to take a theme for a few weeks based on something you've seen that I've done that you’d like to know about (like the interior HDR shots Rachel mentioned; the lighting Ruth mentioned would be interesting as I don’t know much about lighting at all but am willing to at least think about it with you – and how to think about ISO/Shutter Speed/Aperture as it relates to lighting). We could commit to doing a particular type of shot for a few days and then use our photos to study various successes and challenges and what to do about them.
Thought 3. A process thought…what about doing the following:
1. Post photos as you normally would.
2. In the comment section (not the description/commentary/narrative, but where it says "Post Comment" put each of our tags (@888rachel@sullivar@newbank@taffyr) with a critique question or comment that will help us know what you had in mind with the photo (e.g., 'I was trying to do xx with this photo...) and then anything you'd like feedback on (e.g., something specific like: the lighting was xxx and I want it to be yyy, or something general like, what do you think of this as a composition? Even ore general, 'what do you think of this?').
3. When we see our tag in the 'mentioned' list in our notifications, we'll know a photo for critique was posted.
How does this sound? It might be more fun and a good learning experience if we can learn from each other's photos as well -- and I'm not an expert by any means so this way each of you would have feedback from 3 people, not just one. If you’re interested, it probably makes sense to tag us all (@888rachel@sullivar@newbank@taffyr) if you respond in this thread. If it’s too complicated to do this within the 365 thread, we can always share email addresses and continue the planning off-site, but keep the photos and comments on 365.
Needed to see this full screen to really appreciate the hint of stalk. Just goes to show you do not need to fill the whole frame with colour to get a powerful image.
Taffy, I love that we both posted flowers on black, though yours is light years ahead. I see that you mention mentoring and Richard Sayer is my mentor and my picture today is the result of his mentoring. SO I am loving it and recommend it to anyone and everyone who is new.
@maggiemae Thanks Maggiemae!! I appreciate your comment -- I can't seem to get on PP unless I have about 60 - 75 fav's. I've taught myself to stop looking...as it so rarely happens. But if it's because I have a lot of followers, I'd always prefer to contact with others so can live with the result of not being on PP. Though I admit, it used to be nice to see mine up there once and a while...
@taffy@pamknowler@888rachel@newbank That all sounds great to me. I've been having computer issues (I've essentially had to start taping my power chord to my computer in creative ways to get it to turn on....) and I'm trying to decide if its worth sinking money into it or buying a new one so it might be a little while before I start submitting photos of my own, but I will definitely share my critiques in the mean time. My email is Ryan.M.Sullivan@colorado.edu.
Such an amazingly gorgeous iris shot.....might be one of the best ones I have seen! So elegant in its simplicity, so perfect in its purple color, just wonderful! FAV!
Our scouting expedition for future Japan trips has come to a close, and we ended with a big hike up a mountain, carrying all our gear on our backs.
Ruth (Newbank Lass): @newbank
Pam (Pam Knowler): @pamknowler
Rachel @888rachel
Ryan Sullivan @sullivar
Hi Pam, Rachel, Ryan, and Ruth. Pam reminded me that our mentoring group was going to start up this week and I'm wondering if you are all still interested. Just as a reminder, we had left it that we would choose a theme for something we were interested in working on together -- a style, a form of editing, etc. and then learn together through comment and critique. I had started getting us organized and thought that it might make sense to create an email group to start with as it will be easier to keep track and archive our activities that way, but then post our photos and do our commenting online at 365. We also had agreed to put in our commentary something like "for critique group" so that our friends and followers don't inadvertently think we are being too harsh with each other because we would offer critique or ask questions about our thinking. If this makes sense to you, let's start a discussion off-line to determine our theme this week. I'm quite open...some ideas to start with might be: (a) black and white, (b) HDR processing, (c) macro (since that is a theme starting today), (d) structures, etc. My email address is: teraphael@gmail.com. Once we are all connected via email, we can use that to decide on our focus and how long (a month with a certain day a week to post and comment?). I'm looking forward to getting started.
@pamknowler @888rachel @sullivar @newbank Hi Ruth, Ryan, Pam, and Rachel. Very long response…but wasn’t sure how else to do this… I'm quite flattered that you'd think I could help you and am happy to volunteer to be a mentor to the three of you. A few ideas of how we could make this a fun and useful experience…
Thought 1. What about if each of us agrees to look at one another's photos and make constructive comments/observations. I could 'model' the kinds of comments and observation that I think might be useful. We could focus on what worked and why, for example, rather than simply saying something is beautiful, etc. We could also point out areas that, if we were going to work on the photo, we would want to address (e.g., a critical friend looked at a recent photo I’d posted on flicker and noted that the white of the sky didn’t add anything, and suggested I darken the sky to bring out the clouds more. This is a very helpful comment – even if in this case, I’m not sure I can figure out how to do it). That way, each of us would have three other people pushing our thinking about our photos. Looking critical at someone else’s photo also helps me think about my own.
Thought 2. Another thought is to take a theme for a few weeks based on something you've seen that I've done that you’d like to know about (like the interior HDR shots Rachel mentioned; the lighting Ruth mentioned would be interesting as I don’t know much about lighting at all but am willing to at least think about it with you – and how to think about ISO/Shutter Speed/Aperture as it relates to lighting). We could commit to doing a particular type of shot for a few days and then use our photos to study various successes and challenges and what to do about them.
Thought 3. A process thought…what about doing the following:
1. Post photos as you normally would.
2. In the comment section (not the description/commentary/narrative, but where it says "Post Comment" put each of our tags (@888rachel @sullivar @newbank @taffyr) with a critique question or comment that will help us know what you had in mind with the photo (e.g., 'I was trying to do xx with this photo...) and then anything you'd like feedback on (e.g., something specific like: the lighting was xxx and I want it to be yyy, or something general like, what do you think of this as a composition? Even ore general, 'what do you think of this?').
3. When we see our tag in the 'mentioned' list in our notifications, we'll know a photo for critique was posted.
How does this sound? It might be more fun and a good learning experience if we can learn from each other's photos as well -- and I'm not an expert by any means so this way each of you would have feedback from 3 people, not just one. If you’re interested, it probably makes sense to tag us all (@888rachel @sullivar @newbank @taffyr) if you respond in this thread. If it’s too complicated to do this within the 365 thread, we can always share email addresses and continue the planning off-site, but keep the photos and comments on 365.
Wishing you a speedy recovery.
Fav.