Here's another example of some minor photo editing. This one was this alley scene in Ballinger, Texas that you can also see in a bit more detail by clicking the thumbnail.
The basic scene was that of Dust-Bowl-looking neglect or, rather, an epic struggle with entropy. With an empty white truck of the Texas Boll Weevil Eradication Program facing a larger pile of worn-out tires, it looked as if the boll weevil had gotten the upper hand or was about to.
The problem was that there were a couple of business signs in the background that weren't exactly right for "The Grapes of Wrath".
A lumber company and a Radio Shack? Did Tom Joad shop at Radio Shack? No, that won't do. So the new, improved version was this:
Like the photo below, the minor emasculation did not do much harm to this viewer but I think on this one it did.
It contrasted the old buildings with the current utilized modern store fronts.
Actually Radio Shack is kind of fitting in an odd way.:-)
> It contrasted the old buildings with the current utilized modern store fronts.
> Actually Radio Shack is kind of fitting in an odd way.
See, to my eye the lettering on the red mansard roof just leads the viewer away from the lettering on the truck door.
To me the lettering on the truck is just a 'footnote' to the image.
I do not know what format that you are striving for here.
I don't see any boll weevils though.
maybe you can photoshop this one into the image on the roof of the Radio Shack.
🙂
You may have to scale it down a little.
Dust Bowl
> To me the lettering on the truck is just a 'footnote' to the image.
Well, like a work of fiction, it pretty much depends on what the image is about. For me, an important part of the story is that Ballinger is in cotton country so the Boll Weevil Eradication Program truck is an artifact of the place and time in a way that, say, a McDonald's sign or some other ubiquitous chain isn't.
Had the Radio Shack been empty and abandoned looking (and closer to the foreground) it might have added something to the image,though, I'll grant you.
Dust Bowl
I get your point.
If the panorama is the final format then the image is just overwhelmed by the perspective of the utility easement.
Unless the image was taken through the eyes of a boll weevil
Dust Bowl
> I get your point.
> If the panorama is the final format then the image is just overwhelmed by the perspective of the utility easement.
Well, that sense of space is part of the quality of the place also, which is part of the appeal of the rural-looking power line running off toward the horizon. It's a much different sense of place than some city where the entire cityscape is enclosing or full of people.
Dust Bowl
Wow, just wow. That's amazing. I truly never imagined that parking lots in small-town Texas could be so beautiful, so thought provoking, so absent of signage, and so full of mildly interesting trucks.
The middle one of the three light standards is way out of plumb, and this grabs the eye and really conveys the sense of timeless space and light which upon further inspection pervades the entire vista.
🙂
WV
The sense that's lost when one fails to consider the whole composition as shown in the thumbnail, is the juxtaposition of the boll weevil truck and the pile of old tires. I don't know whether to laugh or cry or snore. Just kidding Cousin Kent; I'm a kidder.
WV
> Just kidding Cousin Kent; I'm a kidder.
Cousin Steve, I can't say that it bothers me. :> Photography is an interesting art and the panoramic format is exciting in that it can really convey a sense of space and place. Art photography pretty well divides into (a) photos that have been taken a thousand times before and (b) photos that are discoveries. That photo is a discovery that will look great printed and mounted on 1/2 in. black gator board - Ballinger, Texas, July, 2010.
Kent
I find the crops of the photos very uninteresting. The thumbnail is very interesting with its composition of a blighted area with later construction.
A lonely stack of tires and some falling mortar contrasted with the later construction and vehicles provided a very nice picture.
Deral
the crops are just to show the details that were photo-edited.
