Emotion

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Tree - (c) 2014 Gerard Blacklock

Tree – (c) 2014 Gerard Blacklock
Panorama – 3 frames (non bracketed) stitched together in Adobe PS CC2014
D750 coupled with 16-35mm f4 @ 16mm Aperture: f/8 and Shutter Speed: 1.0s
ISO:100
Out front: Lee graduated filter (0.9x) and Hoya Circular Polariser.

After being fortunate enough to get to the Focus Awards (http://goo.gl/hBQtGQ) on the weekend (Thanks Ray for the tix), there was a very interesting talk by David Oliver (http://www.davidoliver.com.au/) regarding the idea of creating emotion in a image, this was quite insightful but also quite confusing since as a concept, emotion in landscapes is one tricky concept. For landscape images that have a person or human connection this idea of emotion can be more easily achieved, but a landscape with no human elements and true in the sense of a landscape this idea just about escapes me. Looking at the winning images, which are all quite stunning I feel the term mood could be used in place of emotion for a landscape, particularly where there there is no person or human connection.
I also think the mood is something a bit different to the ‘wow factor, for me a image that makes me go wow is often a result a of the initial impact, often generated by distinct processing or colour, the mood however is something which is more on the lasting side then initial impact, for me the wow factor/initial impact often wears off as I analyse a image and dissect it. The mood, however is something that develops and improves with the age of viewing the image, a bit like a good wine 😉 take this example,

Hence, I have promised myself, at the very least for the next few weeks while I remember 🙂 I am going to try and look at a landscape with the specific purpose of capturing and conveying this idea of ‘a mood’ – now exactly how I am gonna do this is, I am unsure of, but it would seem the use of light and selective application of light and often not what you can see but what you can’t is something that can go a long way to getting this mood…. So, here’s a image which i think has no mood in it 🙂 I like it, but I am not happy with it, for me it rates a little better than a snap. It has my favourite element, a single tree but is missing something.. here is a image that I think has mood, but, its created by peeps 🙂 https://blog.avernus.com.au/park-life-2/

How would you generate mood in a frame like this? long exposure it? BW conversion? selfie? I did try a BW conversion, but I can’t bring myself to destroy the colour….

Techie love:
Panorama – 3 frames (non bracketed) stitched together in Adobe PS CC2014
D750 coupled with 16-35mm f4 @ 16mm Aperture: f/8 and Shutter Speed: 1.0s
ISO:100
Out front: Lee graduated filter (0.9x) and Hoya Circular Polariser.

As always, I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed.

54 thoughts on “Emotion”

  2. It's an interesting discussion isn't it. I took something very similar away. Very few of the winning images were bright and breezy. Most had some element of dark moodiness and selective lighting that draws you in.

  5. +Mike Hankey
    well said, I think i came away with more questions than answers.. but I am thinking that's a good thing – it was interesting to see a particular style did well and it made sense that quite a few categories had multiple awards taken out by a single person.

  9. This is a gorgeous image, and post presents a very interesting thought. I think a connection with landscape will evoke us human beings to place emotions on all that inhibits the land. For example, I will find a stone happy and then I can find a stone that is sad. The composition you created with this lone tree feels hopeful and promising. I think if you would have cropped it differently, the mood would change.

  12. great post Gerard and great questions, shame I missed this night (not that I had time over the weekend)
    On occasion I feel the mood of the moment on location then try to bottle it with a touch of O.Sydney flavour added. There was a shot from the RNP walk, "Blue Mood" the processed image wasn't what I saw there but was more what I felt while I processed it on reflection. Hence I added filters, cropped etc to tell a story of a feeling.
    I'd try dark filters to the sky of this image. I'm quite partial to taking a photo and turning it into photo art.
    Was that more than my 2 cents worth

  15. +Darla Hueske very true, its quite amazing how the framing and often the final crop and change the whole feel of a scene. That idea of happy and sad landscapes is interesting concept and goes to the heart of this post 🙂 thanks for sharing your thoughts.

  17. +O. Sydney
    cheers mate, it was a good night, i never planned on going but got a special reprieve at the 11th hour 🙂
    I think your comment about taking a photo and turning it into photo art is the key, you need to do more than just take the photo, you need to see it first and see the potential in the end result. The actual taking of the photo takes on 25% of the process (and effort) 🙂
    Found your blue mood one, nicely done mate.

  19. I do like the pic, and to say it has no mood would not be right by me, or to say it conveys no emotion. Both mood and emotion are both what an individual feels and speaks to all of us differently. Also I am glad that I don't feel alone in my thoughts of this. The winners from sat night are amazing pics, but all of them presented only one emotion in me, gloom. How do we present anything else?

  20. cheers +Scott Soucy , the idea of central elements is one aspect that can galvanize opinions , i appreciate your thoughts and I am glad we are all different have different tastes, it allows me to see things through others eyes and keeps the world interesting, thanks for your thoughts mate.

  21. +Jason Ruth
    good points, I think I am in the after glow of those winning images and hence I feel bright airy images are not doing the mood for me at the moment after seeing them 🙂
    you are right also about the mood, it was very gloomy and fantasy style – but still brilliant images.
    Its also very interesting to see the winning images over the years, I am sure you could spend alot of time trying to pick what the judges are gonna like next year 🙂

  22. to know what the judges will like is the trick, and looking at what the current "trend" or "style" is at that time helps, with a look at the most recent work from the judges.
    The down side to that approach is that it can become a "win at all costs" approach, and is not a way to improve your photography through critique.
    The crucial thing for me is to develop "your" own style, not imitate what the judges shoot and like. That unfortunately I feel will not win comps.
    So the dilemma. Do you look to improve your own craft, or do you look to appease judges and win comps?

  25. Desaturation and desat vignette, selective darkening (maybe to the point where only the tree and maybe a little around it is lit), have a much more ominous sky (aka shoot when there was a storm there :)) 🙂

  26. wise words +Jason Ruth , I think I can safely say that i have not and will probably not ever try and target a image for a particular competition, the only one I enter is the Focus awards each year 🙂 and in all three goes its been a 11:45pm effort before the bell goes lol.. i need to improve my time management skills before my photography skills 🙂
    The crux of it for me and where I started with photography is simply the pleasure of getting out and shooting, whether that be by my lonesome or with liked minded friends, it will always be the key to my enjoyable hobby.

  38. Looks like I missed the big party!! Now onto the thoughts associated with the post. Emotion, mood and light are certainly recurring concepts that I very much see in your works (especially the one tree series :))

    But what you speak of regarding the focus awards is a very specific kind of emotion. Ranging from mostly that which is evoked by the dark, de-saturated, mysterious to the occasional wonders of spotlight shows on sweeping landscapes. A lot of the work on the Focus awards are reminiscent of Peter Eastway's and David Oliver's work. Very specific use of vignetting, desaturation and dodge+burn to bring about laser focus to one subject matter.

    In my humble opinion, it seems that the photographers are trying to portray more of the magic light rather than work on clever compositions.

    While majority of the images are quite impactful and take your breath away, I find that I move on from one image to the next quite quickly. I only linger on works like that of Luke Tscharke's B&Ws as they are masterfully composed while taking into account the 50 shades of grey to bring about mood.

    I believe you are quite advanced in your techniques and skill level to produce great works of fine art. My personal request to you would be to not end up storm chasing or long exposing water but to take a beautiful scene, marry it up with an emotion and then do all you can in camera and post to convey that mood to the viewer.

    I think the one word you should always have at the back of your mind while producing images should be "Timeless". You will have a winner every time.

    Sorry for the long post but I've been thinking and reading up quite a bit recently and work by you and Rodney have left quite an impression. I feel that I have grown as an art appreciator (not so much a photographer) and wished to share my thoughts. Cheers.

  42. +Aravindhan Padmanabhan thanks for the detailed opinion and thoughts, very much appreciated.
    I have seen several images from +Peter Eastway grace my stream over the months , all of which I have liked, particularly the punchy yet not over saturated colours, like this one for example https://plus.google.com/112836969555831052155/posts/RZeY3BWauim – i have looked at it several times and it still hits a note with me.

    +Aravindhan Padmanabhan I agree regarding Luke's images, excluding that one which won the cityscape 🙂 (I can't get exited about the vertical blurry images and they feel overdone in the last year or so). I always enjoyed seeing his images in my flickr stream. Regarding the composition aspect, i always harp back to my old saying no amount of processing will fix poor composition the processing should compliment the composition, i think Adam's image (nobby beach) is a great example of this, note the horizon smack in the middle, yet it still works well.

    I agree with doing as much in camera as possible, purely from a time efficiency point of view 🙂 this is why I love light painting shots, you only take several exposures in a session and its childs play to process 🙂

    Timeless is a hard aspect to achieve also, i only have one image that I would call timeless for me – and i think this relates more from the emotional attachment to it and the representation of the image at a certain point in my life, more than being a great image. The rest fade into history 🙁

    again, cheers for your thoughts mate, these kind of discussions make social media worthwhile imo.

  45. Thanks for taking the time to reply +Gerard Blacklock! That image of Eastway's from Patagonia is one of his best works and to be honest, the entire image looks more like a painting rather than a photograph!

    As you grow, the artist finally comes through in your work and photography becomes the canvas on which you paint!

    Looking forward to some of your best work yet 🙂

  46. Cheers, +Rodney Campbell! Its always great to see people starting a debate about topics they are passionate about. I'm more than happy to sit back and watch the discussion unfold rather than taking part, but this time, it was something that I've been thinking of for a while! Hence I decided to jump in!!

    Keep em coming!!

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