Everyone should take time to Stop and Smell the Roses.....at least for 19 days!
by dassilem

Comment:
Yeah... yeah... that is what I was doing. Smelling the roses. Yup, that was it all right. :)
The way you included the image of the "lost photographer" from the side and behind the foreground rosebud was nicely done. You composed the image well.
Challenges like this gives us a chance to do blends like that of the face with the flowers. DPC does not often provide those opportunities and we need to practice those things in order to make them look natural.
This looks like a composite, but I thought that was not allowed for the challenge. I'm curious to know how you accomplished it. Anyway, in a strait composite I would have brought in the whole face image in, pasted it into its own layer, rotated it to be correct and then used a mask to block out upwanted background as a non-destructive editing technique. That makes it easy to adjust later for the few remaining spots around the far eyebrow and a couple other small places where there is still a bit to much white that you missed. They can be taken care of with cloning too but the non-destructive method is better since it lets you bring back things you cut out and is easier to recover with.
If you have Photoshop you can further apply its lighting perspective feature to match the angle of lighting with the flowers on the face layer and with a little brightness, maybe a little sharpness matching and some slight color correction you can make an exact match with the flowers that will fool anyone. - Steve

Drifting at Sea in a Dingy
by jerseyjim

Comment:
Like the minimalist concept making stdavidson a tiny speck in a great big sea under a huge sky. It visually emphasizes how insignificant we are in the grand scheme of things. You might want to experiment with different crops on the image. Looks like you could cut out some of the topmost part of the sky. It is amazing how much difference cropping makes in an image. The long cloud formation that looks like an jet contrail is a bit of a distraction and you might consider cloning it out.
During my expedition in the desert I certainly felt like a tiny speck in the giant realm of nature... but in my experience it was very, very HOT! :) - Steve

Pegasus
by chrissycampbell

Comment:
This is a well composed and nice sepia image. Focus is rightly on the horses head and it has good tones. Some reviewers will have trouble relating this to the challenge topic.
I'm guessing Pegasus is this horse's name but it is also the name of a mythical horse immortalized as a constellation in the summer sky. Perhaps your intent was to imply I was deep in thought contemplating the nighttime sky. While lost in the desert I saw the constellation Pegasus every night. - Steve

Abstracacti
by xXxscarletxXx

Comment:
Good off-centered placement of the main cactus. Nicely soft focused background. It looks a little overexposed on the bottom center but the image is very good overall.
Ah, yes.. I got very familiar with thorny cactus spines like these during my desert experience. Practically every time I sat down I found new ones I did not know were there and got them poked into various parts of my anatomy. Some were more difficult, painful and perhaps amusing to remove than others. Would have made for great video. :) - Steve

Still Night
by madcrabber

Comment:
This night shot looks good as black and white. Portrait orientation captures the full boat riggings and its reflection in the water nicely. Well composed.
When I was missing the nights were absolutely silent... especially when there was no breeze. In our 'civilized' world we are bombarded with noise all the time. It is nice to experience absolute silence.
While lost the nightime quiet was occasionally interrupted by coyotes howling. They would suddenly start howling, for no apparent reason, and continue to do so for about 2 minutes and then go totally silent again. There would be 20-30 of them yelping into the night all at once and makng lots of noise. Coyotes are constantly on the move and travel in loose hunting groups often spread over a faily wide area. It was disconcerting when I was inside the perimiter of a group when they started to howl because they would literally be surrounding me. They move very quietly and I never knew they were nearby unless they happened to started howling. Coyotes avoid people so there was never a problem for me. - Steve

He's Hiding out in IR Land
by timfythetoo

Comment:
Nicely done IR except for that ugly guy (me) in the lower left corner. Leaving the sky blue works well except I would eliminate it from the rest of the image.
Arizona is a great place for IR imaging. Stark landscapes taken in the early morning make for great IR images. You ever get out that way you might want to try it. - Steve

He's back in the desert...looks like he stopped over here for a short break
by slickshooter

Comment:
Very funny. DOF works great. Nicely done. I would recommend placing the cactus further to the right or cropping off more of the right side better balance. The lense cap placement is a distraction and could be eliminated from the composition al together.
This certainly brings back vivid memories of my experience. The prickly pear fruit you pictured here looks exactly like the ones I lived on. The fruit is very tasty with a lot of moisture. The down side is it contains a lot if seeds. The deep red stains I got on my hands washed right off, though. The tiny fuzzy looking balls on the outside of the fruit contain bunches of tiny cilia-like spines that always kept getting poked in my fingers and lips while eating and I spent a lot of time afterward picking them out. Ouch!
Btw... I didn't have any toilet paper. You can imagine how much fun that must have been. :) - Steve

Found in a Cave
by Structor

Comment:
Nice silhouette, good perspective and sharpness. Great job.
Your subject looks about as crazed as I felt during my excursion into the unknown. The area where I was at has had a lot of mining activity and there are many unprotected, open mining shafts all over the place. You could easily fall into one and be unable to get out. The only ones I saw were deep and had rats in them. - Steve

Soul Searching
by jdannels

Comment:
Beautiful location and well composed image. The view from behind supports your concept well. The main subject placement within the frame at the rule of thirds lower right intersection point perfectly fits the composition and the lake placement within the frame adds viewer interest. Nicely done!
However, I was not wearing lavender underwear during my sojourn into nature. LOL! - Steve

Cabin in the Mountains, "I'm glad he wasn't found in THERE!"
by Jaded_Housewife

Comment:
Old weatherworn buildings will always be fruitful subjects for photography. It does not seem to matter what angles, lighting conditions or perspective you take, they always seem to fascinate. Yours is no exception. This one has good tones and interest in the grain of the wood. You might consider either a complete B&W conversion or leaving muted color only withing the window frame.
Heck, I would have liked to have found a building of any sort for shelter. There was a blazing hot sun out during my walkabout. ;) - Steve