Weekly Competition #342 - Masking Identity Competition

Firstly I would like to thank everyone for submitting their images for this weekly competition. Photography is subjective and every person will have his or her own opinion as to what is good and not so good. In trying to judge this competition my focus was creativity and thought, but also whether the image had any impact on me the viewer.


drofmit Obscured Music
This image had instant impact when I looked at it A very creative idea using abstract patterns to outline the musicians, it reminded me of the Aha music video from the 80s

bforbes Smoke Screen
This image certainly masked the identity of the subject matter, but as a mono I personally would have increased the blacks and contrast that would have given the image more impact. However, if you wanted the image to have a vintage washed out film look then this came across.

davidtrout Fountains Of Notre Dame
I liked the idea of this shot, although I personally thought that the Cathedral was masked too much, this results in the water dominating the image,


TimE Hidden Harbor
I liked the idea of using the trees to mask the harbor, but felt that the harbor and the boats would have looked better if they were slightly more out of focus in relation to the silhouetted trees.


GlynM Anonymous Photographer
Hindsight is a marvelous thing, but even then you would not have known that you would be entering an image for a Masking Identity Competition. However, if you could step back in time, perhaps f.2.8 and a much tighter crop of the face camera and hands would have done the trick?

Darlene SHOOTING FOUNTAIN
Good exposure in relation to softening the water. With the 35mm you obviously would have been unable to change your focal length. The image appears to have been taken abroad, so you were obviously not thinking about masking the building in the background and were concentrating on the fountain, which you did achieve.



drobbia Day of the Dead at Night
This was another image that caught my attention and certainly masked the identity of the subject matter. The creative blurring shows movement of the children in skeleton costumes and works well.

Perspicador Quoi?
When I first looked at the image I wondered what it was, I then noticed the moth / butterfly. As the image is predominantly a silhouette, I personally would have made it into a mono image.

Demanov merman
Obviously Photoshop has played a large part in this image, but I really liked the image and the idea. I would however remove the twig / branch to the left of the image, very creative though.

geordie01 SPOT THE BALL
This image works well as a mono and is sharp and well exposed. The frozen action of the players and spectators is captured well, with one of the players faces masked by the ball, but is not as creative as some of the other images in my opinion.

velimir penetration
This image has clearly had some thought put into it, by using a long exposure to capture a double portrait. I think mono was also the right choice for this type of creative image. A very good effort.

gartmore Old Street, London
I really liked this image, mainly due to the eyes. The car clearly masks the portrait, but I am left wanting to see the image without the car, so I guess in that sense this image really work. A great find, I like this a lot.






JAK Bad Day
Another slightly masked creative portrait image that works fairly well, but for me does not have the same impact of some of the other images.

Noelcmn African beauty obscured by reflections
This image is interesting as it has the reflection of a building in the glass together with a semi-masked face via some kind of a net. A creative effort, but unfortunately the image is not in the top three.

johnriley Earth Mother
Another image with instant impact when I looked at it. Very creative use of Photoshop and images and the position of the eyes and the contact they have are excellent. Really liked the colours in this image too.

coker Robin
I am not a birder and I know photographing birds well is not easy. The bird (robin) looks very sharp and trying to focus through all of that undergrowth is not easy. Sadly in my opinion the main features of the bird can clearly be seen so has to be excluded from the top three final images.


OK the bit everyone want’s to know

1st Place johnriley Earth Mother
2nd Place gartmore Old Street, London
3rd Place drobbia Day of the Dead at Night

Sorry for the delay I was away from home and a computer.

Fletcher8

Well done to John for the win and the other podiums.
Little disappointed that my image and two others failed to receive any critique at all But , ho hum.
Well done to all who entered and thanks to fletcher8 for the comp and judging (partial)

Jim.

Thanks for the comments and the competition Fletch and congratulations to the podium placers. I too was a little mystified why some of the entries were left out of the comments. One such was Judithann's Canadian winter scene which I thought was very engaging.
David

PPG: http://www.pentaxphotogallery.com/artists/davidtrout

You are right guys I should provide feedback for the other three images which i will do later on today OK. I apologise for not including them.

Many thanks for the win, that took me by surprise. Well done all, I'll post the new competition after lunch.

Excellent winner this week, very striking image

Congratulation to you Johnriley for 1st Place , Earth Mother. Also congratulations on 2nd and 3rd

Well done John and the other podium placers.

Great theme Gareth, it had me scratching my head for an entry...

Great Competition.

Many thanks,

Glyn

Congratulations John, on a first place, my choice of a winner too-very creatively done. And congrats to Dartmore and Drobbia. Interesting challenge, so thanks are due to Fletcher8, I think it had most of us scratching our heads for this one. But it brought out some interesting and varied interpretations of the theme. Thanks for commenting on all the entries (and those still to receive comments ) always appreciated.

Woohoo! The coveted second place, thank you very much. Lots of good entries. and only 6MP too

An interesting competitions, matched by the images. Well done to everyone especially those placed and, of course the judge.

HEY JUDGE Fletcher...YOU LEFT OUT PAGE TWO!! MY PHOTO WAS YOUR FIRST ENTRY!!!

TAKE A LOOK AT THE NEXT PAGE!! Boohooooo

JA

Now Congtrat to the winners of page one...Nice photos...

John R...did you noticed the judge did not see page two??

JA

OK, apologies first. I did look at all of the images prior to choosing the top three. However i did over look JimW, Lifespicer and JudithAnn with feedback in relation to their work and for that I am very sorry. I have now rectified this mistake providing you with the feedback that you should have received in my first post.

Regards Fletcher8

Jim-w Obscured By Clouds
Although the use of colours in this image initially appealed to me, the compositional elements confused me slightly. Elements within the frame did mask the identity of the houses to the bottom right of the frame. However, for me personally, I felt there was too much negative space, despite the tones of the clouds. On a more positive note, this image was well thought out, but I felt the end result did not achieve the original intention? A great idea that could have been better in terms of composition and impact.


Lifespicer Birdie? What birdie?
Personally I thought this image would have looked better with more light as it looks under exposed, although from the photo information, it states this was a selfe, so perhaps this made it difficult to take an accurate meter reading?. A good effort although not enough to make it to the top.



JudithAnn Winter Rain and The Old Shed
Another image that certainly masked the identity of the subject matter by creatively using rain on a window. The image of the old shed provided shape with the rain providing texture to the image, which when combined, worked well to create a simple but effective image. However, unfortunately the image did not have enough impact on me to make it into the top three, but it would certainly be fourth in the list from the top.

It had already been discussed and sorted by the time I read the comments. All's well that ends well.

Awww...now I feel so much better knowing that the judge DID indeed see my photo....Thanks kind sir!!!

JA