Guy Tal said:
When working this area I had Georgia O'Keefe's flower images on my mind though admittedly I have not managed to even come close to the sensuous flow of her creations. May be a Y-chromosome thing.
I like the elements of this image, but as you noted, there is no flow to the composition. What was the reason you pressed the shutter for this one? What mitigated that choice?
IMO (I am not humble ;o), the composition itself lacks life. The arangement of the elements is very static. As I look at each element, they grab my eyes and hold them there. This yields a lifeless image. Within a flowing composition one will subtle elements of body language in each element the eye rests upon that urge you to look elsewhere in the image. And following this urge, your eyes move elsewhere, land, take in the scene, and then move one. This is not an X-Y thing, it is visual.
In other terms, the objects themselves are interesting but I do not feel any relationship between them being express here. Each of the four primary blossoms contains leading lines/body language that leads the eyes out of the frame.
Taking the elements at hand and visualizing an ideal composition the blooms body language would create leading lines that draw the eyes from one bloom to the next, with perhaps one bloom having body language that does not achieve this goal. Instead, about that last bloom it would be good to have the blades of grass about it modify/expand the body language to complete the circuit. This last would take a picture of flowers and expand it to be flowers in the grass and tie the two elements (blooms and blades) together into a cohesive whole.
That said, this is criticism and sometimes I can do this. And sometimes I fail. And the visual flow of an image need not not have only one circuit/orbit, it could have many which creates a more complex image.
Here is an example that I think works.
The three leaves have a flow to them. The upper left flows to the right leaf with the green behind it and the partial leaf forming the upper left side grounding it and preventing flow to the left. The right leaf is cropped such that it is left with lines flowing down and to the left. The lower left leaf is cropped to make it static with minimal leading lines which is buttressed by the color change to green which pulls the eyes upwards along the stem of the leaf back to the first leaf. Selective focus neutralizes the right side's corners to soften any leading lines. Although, I feel that even in defocus the leading lines at upper right lead to the in focus leaf at right.
I am not perfectly happy with the lower right corner, but other compositional issues came into play and compromise must be made.
All that said about why I think it works, that was not the thinking I used before taking the shot. While shooting I chose the elements to shoot and then picked the exact angle to hide distractions in the defocus area behind in focus elements and went with it because it felt right. Many times I find wondrous things in fabulous light where there is no composition that feels right. In the field, I go with the visceral feel of a composition and worry about the analysis later as I know that if it feels wrong, then 98% of the time it is wrong. And about 2% of the time when it feels right, it does not feel right later. This is the aspect of found art versus still lifes. Found art is real and it is your vision that brings it forward and separates it from the confusing morass of detail that is the universe.
Any criticism of this image would be appreciated.
Anyway, this is in not to say any one thing is right or wrong, but just one persons rationalizations (conversion of feeling to thought not the negative contextualization of the word) and feelings about the image and some critical thought to go with it.
enjoy,
)
Sean
