Near Peak: We went to Catoctin National Park a few weeks ago, when an internet source said the leaves were "Near Peak Color." They were beautiful, and I wanted to do something to show...

cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD

We went to Catoctin National Park a few weeks ago, when an internet source said the leaves were "Near Peak Color."
They were beautiful, and I wanted to do something to show them, so I took some shots with some special specimens I picked up and placed on a rock. Then, I found some more specials, and put them on another rock. And then I found what I took to be a special rock. So I copied six of the leaves and pasted them on the rock, but I'm a little unsure of the result, so I'd love any advice you can give me for improving the composition.

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veralisa296 Loc: New Jersey

Beautiful leaves...the colors are powerful. The rock is especially striking, too. Let's say, if you were to sprinkle about 10 or 15 leaves on the rock would they all land in the same direction or would the stems appear scattered as well? Just a thought!

UTMike Loc: South Jordan, UT

Beautiful! Thanks for sharing.

Linda From Maine Loc: Yakima, Washington

The leaves appear to be floating above the rock, which could be a cool effect if intended. However, I also feel the rock competes for attention - both in tones and texture.

Wondering if you changed the rock's brightness or saturation how that would affect?

btw, the rock by itself looks like it would be a great subject for an abstract!

cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD

veralisa296 wrote:

Beautiful leaves...the colors are powerful. The rock is especially striking, too. Let's say, if you were to sprinkle about 10 or 15 leaves on the rock would they all land in the same direction or would the stems appear scattered as well? Just a thought!

Thanks for looking so thoughtfully. Do you mean to suggest that I add more leaves, or that they should be oriented more randomly?

cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD

UTMike wrote:

Beautiful! Thanks for sharing.

Thanks very much Mike.

cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD

Linda From Maine wrote:

The leaves appear to be floating above the rock, which could be a cool effect if intended. However, I also feel the rock competes for attention - both in tones and texture.

Wondering if you changed the rock's brightness or saturation how that would affect?

btw, the rock by itself looks like it would be a great subject for an abstract!

Thanks so much, Linda for your very thoughtful response. I'll see what I can do with altering the rock, and with the rock on its own.

tcthome Loc: NJ

veralisa296 Loc: New Jersey

cbtsam wrote:

Thanks for looking so thoughtfully. Do you mean to suggest that I add more leaves, or that they should be oriented more randomly?

Exactly! Yes, scatter more randomly!

Fstop12 Loc: Kentucky

The fall colors are really nice! Linda took the words right out of my mouth. My subjective opinion is, the white streaks in the rock compete with the leaves. The rock is very interesting and stands alone as an interesting abstract without the leaves. As I look at the image, I'm thinking I would use just the single leaf (bottom right) and place it by itself on that rock. Probably try placing it somewhere up towards the top left. Maybe using a Rule of Thirds square crop and place the leaf between the top left and center quadrant. These are all just suggestions, sometime less makes things so much more interesting. Thanks for sharing your image.

cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD

Fstop12 wrote:

The fall colors are really nice! Linda took the wo... (show quote)

Thanks so much Fstop for your very thoughtful comment.

ebrunner Loc: New Jersey Shore

cbtsam wrote:

We went to Catoctin National Park a few weeks ago,... (show quote)

Nice. I think it works really well that you placed the leaves on a neutral background. Whenever I have tried in the past to get just the leaves, my backgrounds always get in the way. Next time I get the chance, I'm going to use your technique. Very cool image.
Erich

cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD

Well, getting more leaves was not happening, as we weren't taking another day to go back to Catoctin NP, and they'd be pretty different by the time we got there anyway. And arranging them more randomly seems to be beyond my capability. Then I saw an image on flickr where someone had hung some leaves on a clothes line, which triggered my decision to try an oppositional strategy I've been practicing for nearly 80 years - just ask my dear departed parents. Instead of more nearly random, I went with very orderly. Let me know what you think.

Hopefully, the very opposite of random

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