Originally posted by mikeSF To me, a photograph like this epitomizes what a great photographer can do.
There are photographs that are great because the subject matter is great and there are photographs that are great because the photographer is great. This image belongs to the latter category!
Most people who have walked by this rock outcrop never gave it a second glance. Probably, no one has ever photographed it before (the exception might be a snapshot of a rambunctious child standing atop the rock or a beloved dog sniffing at the base). It's not the classical dramatic scene of deep valleys, massive mountains, majestic trees, bright fields of wildflowers, or impressive animals that dominated so much of landscape photography. It's just an ordinary rock in a plain field of grass, in front of the some every-day trees.
Yet the image works and works extremely well on so many levels. The elements of this image that I like are:
* the perfect distances between the frame edge and objects;
* the slightly OOF background;
* the bias of the rock to the right of the frame with the sweep of the grass to the left;
* the dark-bright-dark-bright alternation of layers in the scene;
* the bent-linear gap in the branches in the center that seems to lead to the flower-like bright patch of the sun;
* the juxtaposition of sepia-brown cloud and spring-green grass; and
* the parallel angles of the weed stalks with the foreground rock surfaces the 50-50 split of ground & sky.
Excellent work!