Resist all temptations
by Gauti

Comment by whatdewuc:
Although you are tempted to purchase a new canon, the overindulgences of smoking, drinking, and sex are the best elements here. I like the glass arrangement Good luck and HNY.

Resist all temptations
by Gauti

Comment by NovaTiger:
The letters "LOL" can't adequatelty express my reaction to this shot. All I can say is good luck. Perhaps it would have been okay to cut off part of "Guinness?" Just a thought. It also seems a litle weighted to the right side of the shot.

Resist all temptations
by Gauti

Comment by Stagolee:
Forget the resolution life would be far to boring. Good take on the challenge and well composed although the lighting could have been better.

Resist all temptations
by Gauti

Comment by Bran-O-Rama:
Oh my. You must be a masochist! Best of luck to you in your entry and your self deprivation ;)

Resist all temptations
by Gauti

Comment by dimitrii:
Great idea!

Resist all temptations
by Gauti

Comment by Bear_Music:
Pretty good pile of vices, but an unsatisfying compsoition to my eye, and indiffernt lighting

Broken Love
by Gauti

Comment by rmtm333:
Cheers from the Critique Club...

This is a great contrasting version on Konador's image. I studied the image quite a bit prior to reading the comments and your explaination and agree with your execution.

The composition truly represents the heartache of love...Red drives love and the heat of passion, while blue creates a distance, less romantic (cold) feel...and the convenience of the filter being broken just adds strength to this image. The fact that the book was upside down made sense to me prior to reading your reasoning...Love is definately in turmoil here.

Technically, I would have liked it to be a little sharper. I would have liked to see more lighting or more of a spotlight effect as in the original image, however I do like the gleam of the light off the cracks in the filter.

Another option that may have enhanced the contrast would be to have the light shine on the filter from a higher position to minimize the size of the reflecting heart, but of course it may not have appealed to some.

A great entry to this challange and deserving of your 11th place result.

Congratulations.

Regards,
Shawn

Message edited by author 2004-12-30 22:24:47.

Broken Love
by Gauti

Comment by Gauti:
2nd try
First of all: thank you all for your comments and votes. Getting a pat on the back from Dan for creativity/originality means alot to me. Thanks Dan

This is (obviously) a spoof on Konador's red ribbon in the Shadows II challenge.
Here is his original version, called (fittingly enouch) Love:


and his excellent and very funny tutorial about how it was made: How'd They Do That? :: Love

As I said in the Photographers comments I did not break the filter for this. I actually think filters are probably quite hard to break, esp better ones like B+W, but I'm not gonna experiment to find out, thank you very much :) The filter broke by accident and I almost posted a picture of it in the Broken Challenge outtakes thread, as this happend just a day to late for entering the challenge itself. Then I got the idea that let to this image.

The filter was, and still is, light blue (B+W 080 1.5x). And since it's broken, the love must also be broken, right? So it's got 'em blues. That was also one of the reasons why I placed the dictionary upside down, the love has gone wrong.

The book is the horribly big Websters Unabrigded Dictionary of the English Language. Fortunately L is close to the center of the book so the fold was deep enough for a nice shadow. Only problem was that most of the defintions of Love were in middle column (of 3) and therefor far from the crucial fold. So I just folded the page so first column disappeard and the 2nd column was by the centre. But then there was a nasty line which caused even nastier shadows. So I taped the sucker down :) I actually also taped the edges of page so it would be nice and taut. By balancing the book I could make the filter stand up on it own (without the use of glue or Blu-Tack or anything).

To make the page look better I first shot it without filter and used that as Custum WB. Quite a neat trick. Just remember to reset your camera when you're done :)

Here is the original, unedited photo:


Most of the editing work involved blurring the line of the clear tape I used to hold the page in the right position.

I've had a couple of PM's about why I used ND filters. There are several reasons, none of them very good:

#1. I had 'em. I had just recieved an order from B&H photo including 2 ND filters (and a extension tupe set, haven't had chance to use that much yet), and I was just dying to use these ND filters.

#2. For some strange reason I had this idea that DOF was in someway related to the length of the exposure. Now I know better. See also this tread about Aperture vs shutter speed and DOF

#3. Since I had a bit more time to play around in I held a small mirror in front of the filter and reflected some of the light back. By moving the mirror I could highlight some of the cracks in the filter without any noticable shadows on the other side.

#4. Just for the hell of it.

This photo was a lot of fun to take and to have it score well in a difficult challenge (score-wise) was even better.

Message edited by author 2004-12-29 18:55:18.

Broken Love
by Gauti

Comment by Mona:
I love it.

Broken Love
by Gauti

Comment by Gauti:
the gremlins ate my post

edit: always save long posts to Notepad or similar.

Message edited by author 2004-12-29 18:53:54.