The Manhattan Bridge, as seen from the corner of Pearl and Plymouth Streets in Brooklyn's DUMBO (Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass) neighborhood after a week of never-ending rain.
Editing: Levels, crop, unsharp mask.
Comments: I really wish I had kicked away that distracting piece of icky NYC refuse from the lower left corner...
Statistics
Place: 140 out of 371 Avg (all users): 5.3569 Avg (commenters): 6.4444 Avg (participants): 4.9680 Avg (non-participants): 5.6395 Views since voting: 985 Views during voting: 380 Votes: 297 Comments: 17 Favorites: 0
This has major potential, I think. There are photographs by Andre Kertesz from the time he spent in New York (an unhappy decade for him, really) that use just such a technique of refelctions in puddles to break the sense of the ordinary in his images. I hate the comments I recieve suggesting different framing of my photos, and usually hate to make such comments, but in this case I think my feeling is so strong I must do so: you don't need to see the 'real bridge' in this shot. Did you try a horozontal framing, from maybe a step to the right, to play on the contrast beteen the tarmac and the cobbles and the water (especially the cobbles disappearing into the water), and to frame the refelcted support of the bridge more fully in the water? Whilst I think I understand the more purely documentary approach you've taken, I do think the reflection is so understated here that it was never going to succeed score-wise.
However; just as others have said, what's important is what you are trying to communicate.
Hey Josh, just wanted you to know your photo had a lot of merit. I've very sorry to see that it ended up so under-rated. My comment (and maybe others' too) on your title is more out of curiosity. Your title had no impact on my vote. I agree with RonBeam here and altho' I do also applaud beautiful postcard-like photos, I do appreciate a different genre of photos like yours. So I keep these different genres in mind and vote according to my own mental compartments and not make "apple to apple" comparisons.
Could be wrong but didn't want you to think you lost out because of the title. :)
Josh, don't apologize for your vision. Learn from any mistakes that you made, but don't ever back down from what goes into your photographs. The litter in this scene was part of the reality which made this stand away from the "postcard and calendar" sterility that is often wildly applauded on this site. As for your title of this piece .... it is yours. Don't change what you offer from inside. It is not for you to recieve your soul from others; but to pass it to those who would like to touch it.
I'm kicking myself for using that title. Dumbo... the only dumbo here was me for assuming that anyone save for maybe half a dozen other people would recognize that it's the name of a quasi-neighborhood in NYC -- and connect that location with it... :)
Thank you to those who made the effort to comment.
i can't say i understand the title with this picture, but i do like the picture! great urban scene, interesting how the section of bridge just floats in the the water reflection, with the cables leading the eye to the city. nice b&w.
Interesting title, not sure what it means but I really like the reflection of the bridge with the obvious big city feel in the background. It almost moves from deserted slum to busling city in one frame. Very nice
Don't know why it's "dumbo" but this shot holds a lot of character. There could be so many things to pick on but they seem unimportant here. I think I like it so much because the composition comes more from the eye being able to make an existing environment interesting rather than a deliberate set-up. An 8 for me.
This is just great! I love the "Oh by the way, there is a reflection down near the bottom" kind of approach to the theme you have taken. Subtle in execution, but substantive in conveying mood, personality and place. One of my top ten picks for this challenge. 9.
Really like this one. May have been better if you could have got more of the bridge in, though it would probably have detracted from the reflection... Who knows!
a 9 I think...
Wow...at first I did not see the reflection because of my monitor's setting. I thought it was a bad fit for the challenge. Then..I scrolled down and saw the puddle. It is like the reflection on the puddle is filling in for what is missing on the top "crop" of this photo. Great crop job on the top to give the reflection some meaning.This is different than any others that I have seen. 9
I don't get the title, but I like the reflection. I think you could have gotten away with cutting out the top of the picture and filling the frame with the reflection. The middle ground between the bridge and the reflection isn't that interesting and I think the reflection, the bricks, and the sand could carry the picture by themselves. IMHO, you just don't need the bridge.
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