Backstage Kokoro
A "behind-the-scenes" look at selected images in my Kokoro project —
Content, photographic notes, EXIF data, creative process, miscellaneous commentary, and original digital captures. And now with additional audio comments about selected images!
From Kokoro #073 - An Organic Silence
I've photographed dry, yellow grass stalks in the deserts of Oregon for years — and never succeeded, until this image. To my eyes, the yellow stalks are bright, which means white when converted to a monochrome image. The problem is that white stalks agains a field of white stalks makes everything invisibly, well, white. Try to darken them a bit and suddenly they look gray, dull, and not bright. I could show you dozens of examples from the years.
How silly of me not to realize the solution of placing the white stalks against a shadowed background! In this image, even the slightly gray tones in the foreground work because of that shadow. Simple solution it took me years to learn.
Original digital capture (downsized for the web)
1/320 sec at f / 5.0, ISO 160, Panasonic DMC-G6, LUMIX G VARIO 12-35/F2.8, 22 mm
Additional audio comment about this image
I've photographed dry, yellow grass stalks in the deserts of Oregon for years — and never succeeded, until this image. To my eyes, the yellow stalks are bright, which means white when converted to a monochrome image. The problem is that white stalks agains a field of white stalks makes everything invisibly, well, white. Try to darken them a bit and suddenly they look gray, dull, and not bright. I could show you dozens of examples from the years.
How silly of me not to realize the solution of placing the white stalks against a shadowed background! In this image, even the slightly gray tones in the foreground work because of that shadow. Simple solution it took me years to learn.
Original digital capture (downsized for the web)
1/320 sec at f / 5.0, ISO 160, Panasonic DMC-G6, LUMIX G VARIO 12-35/F2.8, 22 mm
Additional audio comment about this image