Footsteps
by shot

Comment:
This is wonderful. The almost-but-not-quite silhouettes, the high-contrast processing, the shadows not fully realized, and above all the odd 'unbalanced' composition all invite the viewer to look at this in a new way. I don't think any honest viewer can say, 'Oh yes, I've seen shots like this before.' Because there aren't any (or at least there are so few that it doesn't count). They walk with some shared sense of purpose, and each with arms caught pinned at the sides. Makes them look like they are playing a game of Simon Says. Maybe they are. 9.

Monumentous
by Lonz

Comment:
It's a simple idea, but one that would escape the notice of many. Would make a great book cover shot for a reprint edition of The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand. 7.

Freestyler
by mrmorris

Comment:
I remember this photograph from long ago. But that's a good thing in a way ... just goes to show what an impression it made on me! I still like the ranks of marching ants, but the best thing about it is the the incisive observation it makes about the process of modern photography with an LCD display compact. I can imagine the subject(s) standing in the usual frozen "I was here" pose, while it's the photographer who is performing for her camera! And of course for a real photographer, like MM, that makes it an opportunity too good to miss. 8.

Restrained
by pepitoid

Comment:
I love horse photographs, especially when they are about the horse rather than simply of the horse. One of the ways to achieve that is to crop it (or compose it) so that we don't see the whole of the horse. It somehow has the effect of getting the viewer beneath the surface; into the muscles and tendons and even the motivation of the horse. Maybe it's just because such a crop is unexpected that it liberates our imagination a bit more. Just like this. 8.

card lock
by zeuszen

Comment:
This is remarkable. Your title explains its provenance, but even so it is still a very interesting study of the margins of art and technology. In this photograph, those margins overlap. Shapes and tones and spatial relationships that are aesthetically pleasing, and yet they have a technological purpose independent of all that. I wonder how this fits with the idea that beauty is aptness to purpose? Surely here, the beauty and the purpose are not connected at all? Hopefully zeuszen might comment on this, and help me out. Meantime, its a 9.

Dichotomy
by aznym

Comment:
Well yes it is, but the fun doesn't end there. The people are arrayed like a line of standing dominoes, ready to ripple into motion. And somehow, the man looking back, out of frame, makes a terrific counterpoint to the man striding out of the other side. It's as if the striding man is going to vanish out of the right margin, and immediately re-enter the scene from the left. 8.

Wild Maestro!
by Gaia

Comment:
That pose seems impossible, doesn't it? It's great fun and a memorable example of what cameras can see that we can't. 8.

Looking Back
by e301

Comment:
It's remarkable that you managed this without either one of these people having looked at the camera with some mixture of suspicion or confusion. I'd say you have here the very last moment before one of them did so. It's an image about the tiny margin between one moment and the next. 8.

Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner…
by Imagineer

Comment:
A lovely simple-complex photograph. I imagine this to inhabit that sacred ground between a candid and a posed portrait ... I'm sure the photographer does not know the man, and yet it's not a stolen moment like most 'street' photographs. Instead it's a shared moment; the man sees the photographer, there is an instant of unspoken communication, and then an instant of shared salute, each to the other. Exactly the thing that makes photography a matter of connection ... between photographer and subject, between photographer and viewer, and (most magically of all) between subject and viewer. The man knows he's going to be looked at by people he will never know, and he salutes them, even more than he salutes the person with the camera. So it's a one-of-a-kind moment, never to be repeated. 9.

The Outside World
by Jewlya

Comment:
This is terrific! Like a dozen or so little movies all running at once. Like an electronics retail store with every television set tuned to a different channel. It's not just a striking idea ... it's also a very clever one, as it makes a point about how everyone in this obviously busy city is also in his own little world. Together and separate. Nice. 8.