Post challenge: WOW! My first ribbon, THANK YOU EVERYONE for the great comments and votes! This is a good way to start the week!
A few have asked on the setup of this shot so I'll give up my secret...
This shot is a double exposure, combined in the camera (Nikon D200). It was created by setting up a white poster board on my kitchen countertop curved in the back to eliminate any harsh edges. I then took a mini-mag flash light and pointed it straight down on our little ab-duck-tee. This exposure was taken at f/13 @ 1.6 seconds.
The second exposure was created by using a blue LED pen light that I turned on and off four separate times. This exposure was taken at f/13 @ 3.0 seconds.
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Place: 3 out of 174 Avg (all users): 6.6214 Avg (commenters): 7.9524 Avg (participants): 6.6071 Avg (non-participants): 6.6289 Views since voting: 10944 Views during voting: 448 Votes: 243 Comments: 42 Favorites: 8 (view)
Steve, Congratulations. You've gotten your long deserved ribbon. This is a wonderful shot, full of humor and personality. I am so proud of you. Way to go.
my psychic powers predict a top ten finish for this picture.
Almost flawlessly executed.
I say almost, because there has to be something wrong with it otherwise I wouldn't be able to take the blue ribbon :-)
Mmmhh... this shot is very nice but there's one very distracting element that avoids me from thinking perfect!
The "light" from the top, the white one, isnt completely round around the duck. I feel that with your center position of the duck it kinda needs the circle around it.
I love the vivid tones and perfect focus. Good lighting, creating the shadow below his bill. I can hear the "Close Encounters" theme in the back of my head too. ;~D
Ha, ha, I just commented on someone else who used "abduction" that they should use the "Ab-Duck-tion". Nice. However, the use of the 4 blue dots looks more like stars are chasing him (kind of like Close Encounters). Might have accomplished the interrogation look better by omitting those lights and just leaving the one spotlight on him or finding a single spot light look.
Oh! Bad pun!!! I like it:-) Anyways onto the critique. The composition is clean and simple in its presentation. The concept is executed perfectly - looking at your photo I can hear the five notes that are widely recognized in the Close Encounters soundtrack. Hmm, matter of fact, it might have been a nice subtle nod to the movie and the musical track if you had 5 blue lights instead of the 4 pictured here. I like the white spotlight that shines down on the duck for it makes one think of the light beam that is pictured as beaming up the ab-duck-tee. The only critique I have is that the spotlight creates such a heavy shadow under the beak. Mayhap if you had a smaller spotlight or penlight that you could have shined under the duck's beak it would have greatly reduced the shadow or eliminated it. To wrap up, wonderful composition and great concept: 9
AB-DUCK-TION
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Steve!
