One of my easiest setups, and this was the first shot I took. I had an extension tube on my Sigma lens, and framed it as you see here- no cropping. I had a brolly box monolight on the top left, a reflector underneath, and a black board on the right. The "tear" was a drop of corn syrup applied with a toothpick. The oulet was live, but I managed to not fry myself.
Processing: Convert from RAW, levels, cloned out tiny specks, dust and scratches, cloned out a piece of screw below the outlet, convert to B&W with Channel Mixer and add slight tint in HSL, dodge & burn tear and left side for definition, blurred the left side more, USM and add border.
It's a shame that I backed into a ribbon this time at the expense of a superior photo. I thought of a better title the day after submitting: "Power Loss." That might have made a difference.
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Place: 3 out of 218 Avg (all users): 6.8324 Avg (commenters): 7.6667 Avg (participants): 6.5679 Avg (non-participants): 7.0510 Views since voting: 59782 Views during voting: 380 Votes: 179 Comments: 55 Favorites: 34 (view)
It is amazing what one can do with just an everyday ordinary object. You took a simple electrical outlet and turned it into a extra-ordinary object that 'sheds' emotion! Lighting in your shot is fabulous for not only do you effectively illuminate the outlet but there is a wonderful gleam to that 'teardrop'. The shape of the 'tear' is perfectly pear-shaped and it glistens from that 'eyeduct'. Love the title too! A double pun on this everyday outlet and that of an emotional outlet.
I love the title. It took a few seconds for the alternate meaning of the title to hit me, and I really like it--brilliant! I like it better than "Power Loss", since I think that "Emotional Outlet" is a pun with greater impact. I think it communicates a more concrete human trait than just the loss of power (which is a potential source of emotion, but IMHO less revealing).
Your creativity is consistently amazing. I'd love to know more about how you come up with your ideas. (On that note, thanks for doing the DPC podcast interview, that was fascinating!)
This was one of my favs (gave it a 9); a creative twist on what was destine to be a cliche image for the second go 'round of Personification (there were a ton of outlet/socket shots in Personification I). Nicely done and congrats on an HM finish.
I saw the thumbnail for this and I knew it was a winner. The extra element added here is stunning and the macro of the plastic is so perfectly lit. It's hard to even look at the "photogrpahy" aspect because the clever idea is so powerful. Even though outlets have been used before, I wouldn't be surprised to see a composition like this on the front page.
very nice. at first i wondered how you got the drop to sit like that. then i realised it was probably glue or something similar. nice reworking of a cliched theme! 9!
Emotional Outlet
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