Looking For Prey (Tilted Challenge)
by Drake

Comment by RulerZigzag:
Awesome shot !

Nervous Nellie
by Drake

Comment by wsargen:
Points for weirdness! Funny looking dude.

Nervous Nellie
by Drake

Comment by rlewis:
mid air!!?? not sure the angle is totally appealing to me

Icy Morning
by Drake

Comment by JerseyGenie:
Oh man, I am shocked that I was your only 10. Maybe I just appreciate winter and its amazing beauty better than some of the others on this site, LOL.
I stand by my vote and am adding a favorite too. Congrats on having such a great eye to appreciate this beauty.

Nervous Nellie
by Drake

Comment by Blue Moon:
it looks like it piddled :)

Nervous Nellie
by Drake

Comment by JimLucas:
That's funny

01-30-08_1866-DPC.jpg
by Drake

Comment by Rmac:
These shots of this lighthouse, are just excellent. What a photogenic place, well done.

Mac,

Lighthouse Drama
by Drake

Comment by adrian45:
This is one of the most unusual photos I have ever seen - and I have seen a lot. Somehow, conditions have just come together, broad light, frost and ice rounding the contours of things, the layers of ice, the smoothness and lack of micro detail, to craft a visual impression that this is actually a model, perhaps no taller than about 12 inches. However, the sea is made of tiny droplets, too small for a model, so that seeing this gives me a strange feeling of unreality - My mind finds it hard to accept that I am not looking at a model superimposed on a real seascape. As we can't see a very detailed full file image of the photo on this website, there is nothing I can do to lessen the strangeness of it.

However, a lovely photo, whatever fortuitous combination of light and time got you there to capture it - and if it ever goes large, as it were, or you feel like showing a snippet at original size, where sea meets building - I would be most grateful if you could put it in answer to this email - my mind just can't see the top of the lighthouse as anything but a model, and yet the sea is real - strange and unsettling feeling, when we are so used to fake things being so cleverly designed to suggest they are real, and yet here is a real scene cunningly pretending to be fake - if only the lighthouse keeper had been up on the lighthouse itself, or had been standing in the doorway below. Very well taken, and congratulations - I would love to see any more taken at the same location perhaps that day or in different light or weather conditions - please?

Message edited by author 2009-01-28 19:09:17.

Lighthouse Drama
by Drake

Comment by dds47:
Really remarkable image -- it's hard to believe it's not an intricately designed model.

Lighthouse Drama
by Drake

Comment by Bear_Music:

Originally posted by aurelie: excellent !! just one critic if i may: the rule of the 2/3 here would have been magic ! but i love the color, the movement & the mood. great photo :)

The "rule of thirds" is only *one* of a number of compositional rules-of-thumb. THis image uses a different one, the "triangular" model. The lighthouse is precisely centered in the image, which plays up the concept of "strength" as it stands there foursquare and absorbs the battering of the elements. There are basically three triangles at work here: an overall triangle of shattering spray with the top of the lighthouse forming its apex, and two smaller triangles, left and right, with the lighthouse itself forming the vertical side of each triangle. This is very powerful juxtaposing of elements, and it's part of why the image works so well. Another key element is the footbridge leading us in from the left. Imagine the image without that bridge, and see how much less powerful it would be. Why? To a large degree because the footbridge injects a counterpoint of tremulous frailty and human scale to the image; it's easy to imagine being ON that bridge, and that's a daunting prospect.

Now, as far as rule-of-thirds goes, the only way I can see to even *have* it in this image (without cropping off the right side so the lighthouse is on a 1/3 line, which would kill the dynamic explosion of spray) is to use a wider lens and include more image on the right. I can't see exposing more tot he left, because the bridge would become too dominant then. So give us more on the right, turbulent water and empty sky presumably, so the lighthouse is on the 1/3 left line, and would the image be stronger? I don't think so, I think it would be less focused and intense.

****

Great work, Drake. For those who think it's overprocessed, my response is "WTF?" I know overprocessing, LOL, and by my standards this is almost too UNDERprocessed. I may take a swing at it with tone mapping just for the hell of it :-)