I have been rediscovering classic games lately (chess, mancala, Pente, etc.) and suddenly remembered the cat's cradle games I played with my grandmother. I had snapped quite a few when my wife decided to rest her arms by drawing in her elbows. Just like that, I found my shot.
Statistics
Place: 25 out of 218 Avg (all users): 6.3617 Avg (commenters): 7.5833 Avg (participants): 6.4000 Avg (non-participants): 6.3315 Views since voting: 2228 Votes: 329 Comments: 41 Favorites: 5 (view)
Composition: I think the composition here is excellent... I like the addition of the 'elbow' to the frame... The balance of this composition is perfect. The contrasts between the hands, string, and the dark background, along with the lines and patternd created here are quite teasing to my eye. I believe that the 'angles' in this shot also strengthen the overall composition. Your choice of angle and including the 'elbows' in this shot seems to have disturbed some of the voters in this challenge... hmm... dunno why to be quite honest. I think the 'strangeness' of the photo angle and the view of the arms creates something special in this image. In short, this is one of those photos that I 'enjoy' looking at. During this particular challenge, I came back to this photo quite a few times.
Technical: I think the exposure here is good. I think it could probably be better. The ISO 400 grain in this shot doesn't really bother me, but i'm wondering subconsciously if the shot could have been even stronger without the grain. Black and white was a good choice on this shot IMO. I believe that any color here would distract from the lines and shapes that dominate this image. Today is the first time I have looked on this image on my laptop at work. I can see your background. This particular aspect seems to bite me quite frequently. Some computers and monitors are cranked up so high on brightness and contrast that this can become a problem. One of the things I do to check this on my own images is to test them by cranking mine all the way up also. I don't do this test in photoshop. I do it in internet explorer. The two programs do not display images the same way. I believe that a slight level adjustment would correct this issue. I did NOT see it on my monitor at home when I originally judged the image. I doubt very seriously that it would have changed my score anyway. In my opinion, 10 means VERY GOOD. The site description of the scoring doesn't say an image has to be perfect to get a 10 :)
Challenge: I think you did a great job accomplishing the challenge topic here. The dark background simply and beautifully isolates your subject. I can't say much more about that at all...
Kudos on a very interesting and entertaining shot... keep up the good work :)
Thanks, folks, for the great input! :) I can see that many of you wanted the framing to exclude the elbows -- and isn't that funny? One person's trash is another's treasure. The awkwardness introduced by leaving them in is one of my favorite things about this lucky shot. The additional angles give the image a "froggy" appeal that suddenly made the negative space more interesting than my initial attempts, which show the arms coming parallel from the bottom. Thanks to my lovely wife for the patient hands! (She assures me her limbs didn't cramp up, but thanks for the concern *wink*). I may go over this photo again for a non-challenge version to manually darken the background so that I can achieve a stronger tonal range on the skin without getting overly grainy.
I love this photo, it's so weird! The shapes of the hands and the string are beautiful in their freakiness, and the "vase" type shape the arms create leaps out at me. 10 - lisae
is it the vase? is it the hands? you have captured one of the classic negative space definitions in this strong composition. were your model's hands killing them during this shot...it is a very strange (painful) pose. cool shot. (9) ~mcmurma
neat. the way the hands are splayed out is very eye catching. somethign is weird about the elbows, though; once I noticed it I found it kind of distracting/detracting.
Great neg spc; good lighting; would have much preferred to see the arms cropped a little below the wrists. This composition looks odd to me and detracts from the overall shot. lhall-6
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