* Wednesday C&C "No Theme" Thread #801 / Revived #021 on 2023 08 23 *

Simple, but very well spotted.
Like green&red or purple&yellow, orange&blue is a killer colour combination.
You simply cannot go wrong with an image that uses these colours and adds textures.

Indeed, why the hell not?
;-)

I don't figure out exactly what we are ACTUALLY looking at here.
They look like pieces of a rusted sawmill, or the frames of boats of which the planks have rotted away, or frames for little greenhouses.

But that doesn't matter, really.

Because what we IMAGINE that we are looking at is so much more interesting than whatever reality may be.
These are dinosaur or dragon skeletons: a jaw line, a rib cage, a spine with vertrebrae.

This is a scene of battle from Game of Thrones, years past the clash in which mere humans brought down one or two Targaryen dragons.

I like your game of Vancouver roulette.
I should try it sometime.

I like that view of the ancient city walls, starkly sun lit, through the hugely contrasting black and dark greys of the surrounding trees.
The architecture reminds me a lot of what we saw in several cities in Iran, especially in Shiraz and Yazd.
That should not be a surprise: that whole area of the middle east was once a melting pot of influences, caravan trade etc.

Your lake/puddle brings the image alive with a wonderful reflection.
Getting really close and really low to a small body of water, with a wide angle lens, in order to create the illusion of a huge reflecting pool, works well.
It is a technique that I use all the time in cityscapes. Car roofs (especially well polished black roofs) can be put to similar use.

Here is an echo of your reflection, showing Castello Sant'Angelo (Rome) a bit before sunrise:

The fact that I am using a puddle is a bit more obvious, but I liked the added texture of the cobblestones.
For a "reflecting pool" vibe, you just have to avoid showing the edges.
Wearing waterproof shoes and not minding to get your knees wet, is a good idea.

I'll say it again.
Indeed : why the hell not?
😁

That is a very eyecatching enhancement of the already quite good image.

To me it looked like Bryce Canyon.
It's a good landscape image that lets us appreciate the different parts that make up the whole.
It could be a good idea to create a series : show the whole wide view and then complement that with closeup of the earth layers, the colours in the trees, the background.

Your otherworldy colours and toning work really well here, and I was wondering why.
I do believe it is the presence of the statue that helps: he feels like an alien in a strange land.

Hi Lou,

I appreciate looking at Leuven through another guy's eyes and seeing your take on two elements of Leuven culture (the first and last image) that will also feature in the book I have illustrated and that will be published next month.

Allow me to give some background and explanation.

The little statue is called "Fons Sapientiae" and that means not the Seat of Wisdom but the Fountain (or Spring) of Knowledge.
The university has that nickname, and I think the sculptor did a really good job of translating that into a visual representation with a playful twist.
Indeed, Knowledge has a habit of filling itself.
(Among students, the fountain is affectionately called "Fonske" (something like "Little Fonz".)

I don't know which ritual we are looking at in the second image. Seems almost more like street theatre than something strictly city- or student related to me.
The costumes are meant to represent members of the "Rijkswacht" (they had those uniforms, and most often also a moustache).
The Rijkswacht were military in organisation and had a reputation of being more tough and prestigious than regular police. A bit like the Carabinieri in Italy.
They did get a really bad reputation with some scandals in the 80s and 90s. They have been integrated in the municipal and judicial police.
But hey, they occasionally still make an appearance in this kind of situation, where they act like "Gendarmes" (of the Louis de Funès kind).

Your third image is the bell tower statue of St Pieters.
It has a specific name : Jacquemart.
Like the statues in Venice, he strikes the hour with his hammer against the bell.
The statue is really sparkling gold.
I don't know the cause but it seems a bit dull and underexposed in your image (also the wall and the sky).

This one has a lot of shock value rolled into a well composed leading lines image. A poster for climate change, perhaps?

Looks like a place where a regular camera would be a hindrance! The iPhone did you a decent job, you got the lighting you needed, and a nice portrait framing that makes the most of the steps and the figure descending them. The reflection off her headlamp becomes part of the composition, lying parallel to the left side of the ancient stone steps. It doesn't look like anywhere I've ever been so I'd like to know more about it.

Agree with @minniev It's very effective and outstanding composition-wise.

To Mike Fewster:

Passing Squall - Central Plains, Molokai

I agree with your reasoning of shot 1 over shot 2. It's the simplicity of the contrast that gives the power. Too much additional detail pulls attention away from the contrast.
You might increase the contrast by taking a little off the top so the width of the sky and the yellow foreground match. This gives a visual impact similar to the graphic of many flags and flags are all about graphic impact.
[/quote]

Yes,

It's been hanging, framed in our family room for years, cropped, much as you suggest.

Rich

Minnie,
That area in our smallest neighbour country, the Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg (east of the small country, around Echternach in the east and Mullerthal in the west) is nicknamed Little Switzerland, and that is not a bad name : it is an area spectacular with age-old bolders, crevices, canyons etc in foresty terrain.
It is a three hour drive away from Antwerp, and the closest thing we can get to mountain hiking in our vicinity (the German Eiffel is adjacent).

All information can be found here (the site is multilingual - I linked to the english version):
www.mullerthal-trail.lu/en

The trails sometimes run remarkably close (or parallel) to traffic roads, but they manage to avoid them for the most part, by staying high on ridges or deep in canyons. Berdorf is a prime spot, close to the best rock formations for hiking and climbing.

We spent three days there, doing Loop 1 (with some extensions) in two halves (on our first and third day), with two nights camping in Berdorf, and a spectacular local hike on the second day. Hiking distances 28K on day 1, 19K on day 2 and 17K on day 3. Those are my distances: the others did slightly less, because I insist on climbing every panorama and crawling through every crevice....

That photo is good, it really does conjure up thoughts about 1001 Nights.
Good choice to use B&W, It works well, especially if that lake was just a muddy brown in reality
The only critic is that if you look closely at the image, in full size, there is a stange looking noise structure in the sky, like lots of little worms.
If it disurbes you,...with your favourite PP software, ...masking that error and making a noise reduction on the area would get rid of it, like in this edit below