Good Bad and Ugly

Submitted by cathy.crowther… on

Happy New Year! This is the time of the year for retrospection and resolutions. Of course 2020 was challenging for many photographers because travel has been restricted and social gatherings largely banned due to the pandemic. Photographers all over the world have been confined to their local neighbourhoods.  However, in many cases this has resulted in people discovering opportunities that they had previously overlooked. I have come up with my Good, Bad and Ugly photos from 2020, and looking back over the year, many of my pictures were taken in the local woods. It was the first place that I went back to when the first lock down ended.

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Tree Tunnel

Though the local woods are convenient they don't offer the prospect of wide vistas or architecture or reflections which I would normally  hope to find when  out and about on longer trips. So I have to work harder for my pictures and more visits are needed to get pictures that I am happy to keep.  Sometimes though, working harder for something pushes you to try new techniques or approaches which can push your photography forward. That could be a silver lining to the year's restrictions.

 

For my first GOOD picture I have chosen ‘Tree Tunnel’ because it illustrates the benefit of visiting one place regularly. I have walked up and down this path in the woods so many times, but on this occasion, in July, I spotted this perfect circle formed by the shadow and the light, framed by the trees either side. I have subsequently photographed it at other times but I associate this image with the surprise of seeing it for the first time. You have to stand in a particular place on the path for it to work, and obviously it disappears in the winter.

 

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Autumn Trees

 

My second GOOD image, ‘Autumn Trees’, was taken in November in the woods near Symonds Yat - the day before the second lock down. Hundreds of people were in the shops doing their Christmas shopping and we were in the woods taking photos. I think that this picture benefitted from the work I had been doing in my local woods.

 

We got some good pictures of the viewpoint at Symonds Yat, then we did a loop walk through the woods. This picture is taken looking back down the path where we had just walked. I like the way the two trees on the left were lit by the side light. The backdrop for the tree branches reaching over the path is a bank of trees in the sun. I also took a horizontal shot but I prefer this one because it emphasises the slender elegance of the tree trunks. I have printed this one for my scrapbook.

 

Well that leads us onto the bad. It goes against the grain to show your bad pictures but to an extent, if your photography improves with time then you start to see faults with the pictures that you used to get excited about. If you can see things that you would do differently in hindsight then that is good, it shows that you are increasing your knowledge and experience. In my case much of my photography is still experimental. I may take over a hundred pictures on a day trip and then keep twelve or so and print two or three for my scrapbook.

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Three Trees

 

I think that the process of going through my pictures and selecting just a few to keep is very helpful because it means that I have to make a judgement about which ones I prefer. It is obvious if pictures are too dark, too light, not focused, cluttered or unbalanced. Beyond that I find that after a while I can make quick decisions about whether I just like a picture. The final test is printing. Printing is expensive so I have to really like a picture to print it and that forces me to make decisions.

 

My first BAD picture, ‘Three Trees’, seemed like a good idea at the time as it has many elements that I look for in a photograph: interesting clouds, good light, nice colour in the wheat, layering, and three separate trees, two of which are placed on thirds. I took this picture at the Begwns in August.

 

 

The  problem is that in retrospect these compositional elements didn’t come together to make a navigable picture. The wheat separates us from the trees. There is a big bush on the left, which detracts from the Three Trees. Most of the trees disappear into the scenery behind. The clouds are nice but don’t relate to anything else in the picture. I think that this was the first sunny day for ages and I just wanted to get some pictures.

 

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Sunbeam

My second BAD picture, 'Sunbeam',  results from me not being able to translate what I saw with my eyes into a picture in the camera. When I was walking through the woods I saw this beam of light coming through the tree canopy. I managed to get an exposure but I was at ISO 800 and there is no colour. It doesn’t print and it doesn’t look as exciting as the light that I saw when I was there.

 I need to learn some new skills in this area and one place to start will be to use a tripod which will allow me to use longer shutter speeds and consequently a smaller ISO number. This will allow more information to get to the camera sensor and result in more information being available when I edit. My aspirations are exceeding the capabilities of my hand-held photography. That is okay, it is good to have things to aspire to, and good to learn your limits. I have got a tripod now, so my New Year photography resolution is to get out to the local woods with it, and to use it.

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Dark Wood

For me, this next similar looking picture - Dark Wood - does work. I have put this in the UGLY category because it gets mixed reactions from people. Some people don’t like it at all.

 

The central tree is the main subject and the light falling on it makes it interesting partly because of all the small branches sticking out horizontally. Is it creepy? It puts us in a dense wood. We are in the shade with these dark saplings between us and the tree. In fact I am on a wide path looking into the wood but that is not what this portrays. The editing was tricky but is does print effectively and I quite like it.

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Broken Tree

My second UGLY picture is also a tree and a poor broken specimen it is, but then perhaps that means it has a story to tell. On this particular day it had just been raining - at one point I had to shelter under a large conifer and put my camera inside my coat for protection. The rain has darkened the bark and the slight mistiness separates the contrasting younger vertical trunks from the woods behind. The moss and shattered branches on the broken tree speak of age but there is new growth in the top left corner so all is not lost. This picture tells me that I can get different pictures if I go out in bad weather, but it is not always easy to act on that when I am inside in the warm so I hesitate to make a resolution to go out in bad weather.

 

Well, that’s it for 2020. Let’s hope we are able to get together as a group again in 2021. In the meantime I will keep looking for photo opportunities and I look forward to seeing everyone’s contributions in the online competitions in 2021 .