Oregon's Central Coast

[JeffKohn]

Here are some more images from our time on the coast when visiting Oregon last month, this time in black & white. Feedback and critique always welcome. There are a some more in the gallery here. Click on any image below for the PBase page with EXIF and shooting info.



Yaquina Head Lighthouse




Cobble Beach




Siletz Bay

[button]

Image #1:  Excellent.  The luminosity gradations and the lines/curves "smooth out" the aggressiveness of the jagged rocks, allowing the viewer to more leisurely cruise through the details.  Perhaps toning down the local contrast in the sea (to bring out more detail) would ehnace this effect.

Image #2:  Another winner.  Multiple converging lines propel this image, running the gamut from horizontal to vertical, anchored at the far left upper 1/3 of the photo.  I think that adding just a bit of gradated burn between the less-than-45 degree line running along the background rocks and the greater-than-45 degree line running to the bottom right corner would both better set off the rock in the bottom left, as well as further unify the composition.  Interestingly, the rock points to the top center third, while the lines meet in the top left third.  This image demonstrates impressive compositional sophistication.

Image #3:  I'm not sure I get this one- maybe the tension created here bothers me.  Specifically, alternating areas of bright and dark and the position of the dominant rock in the foreground against the sand peninsula in the background create disharmony for me.  Is that tree in the upper right coming from the rock or the sand?

John

[wolfnowl]

I don't think I have much to add beyond John's excellent assessment.  Thanks for sharing them!

Mike.

[oldcsar]

#1: The lighthouse on the rocky shore is a little on the common side with respect to photo ops... but I like the tonality here, and the positioning of the lighthouse near the edge of the frame.

#2: This one has the strongest composition in my opinion. Positioning focal objects at the edges may not work for all scenes, but the orientation of the rock in the lower left corner is quite nice, as well as what appears to be a tidal pool on the upper right edge.

3#: Very interesting subject-wise. It is hard to tell with a small web graphic, but it appears to me that there is too much depth of field in this shot. The edge of the shoreline on the right side of the horizon is a little distracting, and it does not contribute much to the scene. In my opinion, it would be a nicer photo if this aspect were out-of-focus relative to the outcropping of rocky shore in the foreground. It is certainly a matter of taste, and this is the only thing I would have tried to correct during capture time... a similar effect could be achieved in post-processing if so-desired, but this is really a minor point of criticism and at least worthy of mentioning.

[RSL]

Jeff, I pretty much agree with Old. If all the photographs and paintings of "the lighthouse on the point" could be placed next to each other they'd reach all the way from somewhere to somewhere else. I agree with Old that the composition in #2 is strong. B&W and Aperture magazines seem to agree, since I see that picture fairly often in both of them.

I think #3 could have been the best of the bunch. I don't think depth of field is the problem. If you'd fuzzed up the hillside on the right you'd also have fuzzed up the sea and the horizon. That wouldn't work. The problem is the intersection of the trees on top of that rock and the shoreline behind them. It's impossible to know without being there, but would it have been possible to move a bit to the right so that the trees fall just to the left of the shoreline? That might have solved the problem.

By the way, it's always a pleasure to see someone work in B&W. B&W teaches you about the distribution of forms and about graphic weight. Unless you're very careful, color can throw you off on those things.

[JeffKohn]

Thanks to everybody for the great feedback, it's really helpful. Lots of useful insights. I do realize some of these subjects have been heavily represented by photographers past and present, so that's a valid comment (and I did ask for critiques). On the one hand, I make no apologies for shooting the subjects I enjoy shooting, and I also have no pretensions that my images are ever going to end up in a NYC gallery. On the other hand, I do feel that originality and finding my own creative vision are worthwhile goals, and that's easily the biggest challenge I struggle with in my photography. So that's definitely something I will continue to work on.

I was pretty certain the lighthouse shot in particular would get some 'overshot' comments, and I don't really disagree. I almost didn't post that image; but I did like the composition, and was pretty happy with the B&W conversion. So I was curious whether anyone else would feel that those aspects elevated the image above cliche status.

The compositional notes about the second shot are interesting to me, because I wasn't necessarily consciously aware of some of those elements when shooting. I'm not sure whether that means composition is becoming more intuitive for me, or if sometimes I just get lucky.  This kind of feedback is great though, because it helps me learn more about why successful images are successful, and vice-versa.

I find the reactions to the last image most interesting.

John - to me the tension created by the tonal layers is a big part of what I liked about this image. Having been there and seen the foreground rocks in person, it never even occurred to me that there would be any ambiguity about whether the tree was growing from the foreground rocks or from behind them (it's the former), but looking at the image now I can see how that might not be clear in the web-sized version. I think there's less ambiguity when viewing it larger; I recently made a 16x24" print of this one to show some folks, and I think it works better as a large print.

oldscar - interesting that you bring up the topic of whether too much DOF can hurt the impression of depth, as I was just reading a discussion about that the other day. I do agree a subtle softening of far-away details can be a useful visual indicator of distance; although as you say it's hard to judge at this size, since pretty much everything will look sharp in a small JPEG I'll have to take another look at the print with this in mind.

Russ - I do agree that some separation between the foreground trees and the coastline behind them would have been ideal. I was limited by the location though, as this was shot from just off the highway right in Lincoln City. I think moving left or right would have meant including objects in the image that I wanted to avoid (beach houses and such). I recall quite a bit of walking back and forth and trying different heights to find a perspective that worked best. I also tried some shots from closer in with a wide-angle, but they just didn't  work.

I agree with you about B&W. I'm finding I really enjoy working in monochrome, and I think my photography has improved because of it. For just about anything but color theory, I think B&W is probably a better learning tool, because as you say color can mask underlying factors in an image.

[dalethorn]

#1 is superb - color, texture, form, everything.  Too bad there are so many lighthouse photos, and some perhaps a lot like this.  Still, it's your own, and it looks really good.