Saturday, March 27, 2010

the playmate

the playmate
the playmate

I had went upstate to Sullivan county with another photographer and friend, Georgine Benvenuto. We had nothing but bright sun and clear cloudless skies (not great for landscape and outdoor photography).
Spotted this tree swing and decided to use the blank clear bright sky and hard sunlight to create the stark and minimilist scene of this somewhat scary tree with swing.
Added a sepia type toning through some gradient mapping as well as trimming away some distracting elements and came up with something I thought worked as i imagined when I first began composing the shot in my viewfinder.
The playmate
Sorry its been so long since I have posted or visited any other blogs. Been too busy for my own good. . .

21 comments:

DJ said...

Great composition and visual impact.
Well done~
No apologies necessary for time-lapsed developments of busy-ness.

Catherine said...

Goodness ~ that tree does look a little scary ~ ha! Great photo!

Hope you get to slow down and relax soon!

kyungmee said...

First,Congrats on the placement..I read it off to my left in twitter comments? Nice to see you back! Wonderful image and always creative eye:) What a cool find!

chasity said...

what an amazing photo...
gives a real sense of isolation and intrigue.

Sueann said...

This is stunning!!! Beautiful!!!
Hugs
SueAnn

Bonnie Zieman, M.Ed. said...

Hey Gary - I missed you, glad you are back.

This is a great shot - full of symbolism. Such a study in our precarious balance between something (earth) and nothing (sky)... how easy it is to lose our hold on one and swing off into another.

I could go on ... but will not give away toooooo much of my inner workings by telling everything I see in this stark, interesting rorschach 'blot'.

The care and effort you put into your work offers so much for the viewer to contemplate ... on many levels.

Hilary said...

Welcome back. That does indeed look stark and a tad frightening. Nicely done.

Victoria Bennett Beyer said...

Fantastic.

Unknown said...

Strong image and I agree, spooky!

Cheers!
Julie
Julie Magers Soulen Photography

Daryl said...

I'll be back .. Blogger is not playing nice, your photo is missing .. but so are mine .. aaaaargh... Mondays

Unknown said...

fantastic, what expression. How you can get a photo of a tree to sum up such emotion, what a gift!
Karen

Paul C said...

There is an interesting juxtaposition of age and youth here also.

Daryl said...

LOVE it ... its so perfectly simple and says so much w/o saying a word ..

myan said...

gary, i love the mood of this! sounds like a fun trip though!
glad you are back! :)

Anonymous said...

A loneliness feeling, underlined by the sepia nuance. Being on center, the tree (with apparently abandoned swing) amplifies all that. Wonderful shot, very special.

Antonio Estevez said...

I dig this big time, gary. I gravitate towards the creepy and am in love with this shot.

Anonymous said...

love the starkness of this: inviting yet lonesome and an apt title too.

theresamillerwatercolors said...

Beautiful!!!

Culture Served Raw said...

Gary, you have a very unique style. Your work brings to mind a quote I once heard: 'the still photograph is to moving pictures what poetry is to prose-less comprehensive perhaps, less literal even, yet somehow capable of expressing a deeper truth'

Ps. Love the True Evil Self Portrait. Brilliant stuff!

Elena said...

Amazing pictures.Good work.

Anonymous said...

Dramatic shot.