Z is for ....by
adriano74Comment by JakeKurdsjuk: Critique Club Comment:
I love the visual impact of this image. The stark colors against the black background, and lighting that brings out the detail in the fabric. Perfect example of how simplicity can often trump more complicated compositions. Your statement about setting WB to Fluorescent makes me wonder what the colors were originally.
Compositionally this is very strong, with lines leading the viewers eye up from the corners and then down into the depth of the trio. Any other order of colors would not have worked as well (did you try?). You obviously spent a lot of time getting the three of them to line up so well, and risked nothing by shooting at ISO 100 and 30 seconds. Which makes me wonder how you managed to miss the slightly skewed symmetry? That's my only real nit to pick on this photo, but for me it's a big one because everything is so stark that it's immediately obvious against the black background. This one is due partially to a slightly skewed camera rotation (fixable in post, ~1.2 degrees left), as well as the top zipper set slightly off on the right side (fixable using Free Transform with the Distort option in Photoshop). This is ultimately a minor thing for most, but it's one of those things (like crooked horizons) that are so important, to me at least, when differentiating a good photo from a great photo.
The only other thing I might have fixed was the reflection of the bottom zipper against the black surface, either eliminating it completely (could risk a DQ, I suppose), make it less distracting by muting the light and color more, or bringing it to the fore as an obvious reflection (you can see from one comment that it was misinterpreted as a 4th zipper).
Again, a really fine image, and well done on the top 5 finish.