K-2
by tome

Comment:
Ha! I knew it!
Congratulations Tome! Exceptional placing and a thoroughly enjoyable image.

Can't make a sandwich without the bread!
by jamesgoss

Comment:
Hello and greetings from the Critique Club-
First and foremost, the thing that strikes me about your entry is that the challenge prompt desires that we show the whole of an object through its constituent parts. You have disassembled your object, but I am not personally given a definitive sense of a sandwich through what I see. Part of this is due to the shallow depth of field, which shifts me away from the parts, denies me the chance to reconstruct the object through its parts, and the assembled sandwich in the background simply shows me the whole object on its own, but not through the parts. As a general rule, setup shots of this nature need to be exceptionally clean to really push them over the top into the really successful realm. I would suggest you study Oliver’s work ( h2) to get an idea of what I mean.
Beyond that, your lighting is pleasing. It has a very natural feel to things, providing a nice depiction of shape, light and dark. Your sandwich parts are well saturated, but not terribly garish either, so they look luscious and enticing (everything has a fresh look to it with perhaps a small exception going to the cheese, which looks like it might be getting a bit dry).
Overall a good take on the challenge, but suffers from the pedigree of shots in this category that precede it. To score well with a shot like this, the voting community largely expects perfection, so it’s a tough field style to score well with.

Aphrodite (The Shell)
by navegante76

Comment:
Hello and greetings from the Critique Club.
Weston was known to stress the form of his subjects, to remove them from our mind as simple objects (a shell) and convey their very “is-ness” or essence through his photos. I think you’ve done a decent job of that with this entry. The crenellations in the shell, particularly the fashion that they reach deeper into the subject, really defines things well. I also particularly like the right side of the shell, with the inlet leading into it, an access point to its depths. I’m quite alright with the edges not being so definite, so absolute, as it encourages a departure from the objective identity of the subject. All in all, I think this was a good product put forth for the challenge. There appears to be a little bit of the background evident, ever so slightly, in the top and bottom right, which could have been darkened, but this is minimal and of little consequence. All in all, good entry in a tough challenge.

Norris House
by amcrory

Comment:
Hello and greetings from the Critique Club.
In your photo, I do get some of the sense of starkness that permeated Weston’s work. Your photo is matter of fact, “here is the house,” even presenting it from the most matter of fact point of reference possible (the street, centered, dead on). But this is done to such a degree as to be to a fault. Many of Weston’s works contain standard objects which, though often placed in standard or typical poses/positions, are still depicted in a fashion that maximizes the lines present in them, exemplifies form. This is particularly seen in his architecture shots, which typically have a bunch of lines going this way and that. In those shots which are depicted head on, lacking in depth, there is a discord amongst the lines, a dynamism and tension created through including bits and pieces of structures, showing their relationship to one another. Many others show a structure from an angle, giving a more complete definition of form, showing their depth, their convergence, their many layers. I think your entry is robbed, somewhat, of this.
Ultimately, though, I think what had the largest effect on your score was the sky and the fashion with which the areas get blown. They are simply very distracting, they battle the subject for primacy, and this is very anti-Weston. I would like to note, however, that (in my opinion) the relative “Weston-ness” of entries was not really correlated to score (consider the top entry, a hallmark of romanticism). Whilst you may not know as a new DPC member, blown areas, and particularly areas blown with little reason, are a oft hated photographic element, and those areas in your are quite distracting, in any challenge. You’ve shown quite some Chutzpah in entering this challenge as your first, as the prompt had many scratching their heads quizzically, so I hope you stick around and keep at things. This wasn’t an easy challenge to score in, not least importantly because the voters didn’t really know how to vote it.

No Parking
by Melethia

Comment:
I think you were robbed on this one, Deb.
I love how synthetic nearly everything feels. The giant containment buildings, the wall, parking lot (confusingly labeled with no parking), barbwire, gates... even the flowerbed feels fake, put there to meet an end. The tree is the only thing that feels alive, reaching off away from the scene.
I like how the white line cordons it off, as well.

Genesee Night View
by juliejold

Comment:
Very nice scene. I'd like to see you emphasize the abstraction further, take it where it belongs, in the realm of who knows what, increasing the mystery by decreasing the clarity of the scene. Let us form it where we will in our minds, apply our own constructs to the form. Those spotlights and the ribs of the bridge beg for it.

The Barrel Factory est 1892.
by mrbig65

Comment:
The antique feel to this is much appreciated, working quite well with the scene itself. Nice.

Homeless
by MrHllywd07

Comment:
To me, this feels very much like a matter of fact portrayal, an unfortunate summation of him as "homeless." These sorts of shots feel much fuller, better, and humanizing when they become a character study. It seems like you talked to him a bit, and I feel little of his "himness" was captured here. I'd like to see more of a depiction of him, not a shot that seems like it could just as easily have been had lurking off in the distance with a super-tele. Humanizing the subject brings their plight more acutely, but this feels colder.

Still standing
by Adz

Comment:
I love the immensity of the building, brought home all the more by the bird circling above. Not sure what's off to the right but feels like I'd like to incorporate a bit more of whatever from over there.

Boatyard Shed, Duxbury Harbor
by Bear_Music

Comment:
My first reaction upon seeing this was to raise my eyebrows, thinking "huh, now this is something." The fastidious alignment just aids all the more in emphasizing the starkness of the scene. Truly, the best part of this image is that it demands you evaluate it as an image, as a complete scene, one which is not its parts but its whole. Each little bit can be dissected and thought of individually, but mentally they always return to the whole. The ramp, the pallet, the stacks, windows... all their own bits and pieces but they melt back into the entirety of the image at their earliest convenience. A nitpick is I'm not sure how I feel about the mast, just because it seems to be aberrant to the order of the rest of the image.
I just perused The New West again today, and there's something reminiscent here.
Did you shoot this in the Dynamic BW mode, or RAW and convert on your own? It strikes me as a scene that would perhaps be well suited for straight from camera for the LX3.

Message edited by author 2011-04-12 07:00:56.