minniev Loc: MIssissippi

Introduction
This month we will look at a young master's award winning work. Recently 24 year old Kelvin Luen was named the winner of International Landscape Photographer of the Year award for 2020. Professional and amateur photographers from around the world were invited to enter folios for the competition and a chance to share in the prize pool. ILPOTY is one of the most lucrative and prestigious contests among landscape photographers. From over 3800 entries, Luen was selected.

Luen started taking photos at 18 when he borrowed his cousin's camera for a hiking trip. He soon fell in love with nature, and has been capturing landscape photos for the last six years. He became a full-time pro after graduating college in 2018. He says, "The International Landscape Photographer of the Year award has been my only focus for the past four years. I’ve studied the past winners’ works and I believe ILPOTY presents the highest standard of landscape photography in the world.” 

Study this image from Tromso, Norway and share your opinion about it. Below are some links to more information and some questions that may spur your thinking. Answer any that appeal to you, or just share your thoughts.

Questions:
1. What do you think of the composition? The subject matter? Would you want this on your wall? Why or why not?
2. It would appear that editing plays a significant role in this image. How do you think he achieved this look? Does it appeal to you visually? Do you think it is too much? Not enough?
3. What do you think of the color palette? Is it realistic or not? Does it matter? Does it appeal to you?
4. Follow the first link below to review the ILPOTY online flip book with the other images in Yuen’s winning folio and the images of other top award winners in the contest. Do you agree with the judges’ decision? Is there another photographer entrant whose folio holds more appeal for you? Explain?
5. If you have a favorite landscape photo of your own from 2020, you’re invited to share it here for others of us to enjoy, especially those of us who live in unphotogenic locations and did not have a chance to travel in 2020.

Links For More Info
https://www.internationallandscapephotographer.com/
https://500px.com/photo/1024951416/landscape-by-kelvin-yuen
https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2020/11/top-shots-2020-international-landscape-photographer-year/617138/
https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/news/are-these-the-worlds-most-stunning-landscape-images
https://www.scmp.com/photos/3111756/hong-kong-landscape-photographer-kelvin-yuens-surreal-works-art
https://qz.com/586156/this-teenage-photographer-shoots-the-natural-beauty-of-one-of-the-worlds-densest-cities/
https://www.thecrankycamera.com/blog/international-landscape-photographer-2020-awards

fair use: https://www.internationallandscapephotographer.com/

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Linda From Maine Loc: Yakima, Washington

Oh yes please, I do very much want this on my wall! The emotional impact is great: I feel the trees are doing happy dances to celebrate the awe-inspiring, magical beauty of the mountains, light and stars.

The composition couldn't be more perfect IMO. It offers depth, leading lines and balance. I could guess about processing (raw, HDR, dodge and burn), but the technical aspects are of little interest to me in this particular result because they seem "normal" - no tricks. I could be 100% wrong of course

Re the other entries, the third link seems to be the one that shows the larger-sized pics. I liked a couple of the abstract-looking close-ups; the Mt Rainier shot (Little Tipsoo Lake) charmed me since I've visited there often, and have seen Miss Rainier in her peek-a-boo mode frequently. Some of the landscapes seemed boringly familiar as to subject or composition/technique: reflection, lone tree, moon, slow shutter speed etc.

Here is my own favorite landscape photo from 2020, though I didn't shoot all that many. It's my interpretation of the bounty of a harvest that most take for granted (when are there not apples in your grocery store? )

Thanks Minnie!


nostalgia, on Flickr

minniev Loc: MIssissippi

Thanks Linda! Appreciate you sharing your thoughts. Your ideas about why the composition works are so descriptive. And I love your bumper crop of apples!

srt101fan

Minniev, you got my aging brain cells going with this one. My hesitant response is that, no, I would not like to hang this one on my wall. Why not?

A while back I started a UHH topic “What attracts us to a photo? What makes us like a photo?” (https://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-678775-1.html) I listed a few criteria I could think of (no doubt there are more!). In no particular order:

1 - It realistically depicts a subject I like
2 - It evokes pleasant memories (childhood/relationships/travel...)
3 - It expresses beauty via form, color, shape...
4 - It depicts interesting, thought-provoking forms, colors, shapes
5 - It teaches me something (historical sites/events...)
6 - It projects a sense of mystery I'm drawn into
7 - It projects a sense of serenity and peace
8 - It makes me think about the human family

Applying these to the photo, I would say that it doesn’t match up strongly with any of them; #3 to some extent, #4 and 6 a bit more. So there are not enough positives for me to pound a nail in the wall to hang it. And there are negatives. The photo brings out my bias against “overdone” landscapes. I’m not sure why. But while others might ooh and aah over the green-yellow light (aurora borealis?) I find it distracting and disruptive – the image might be much better without it (or, I should say, I’d like it much better)!

You mentioned editing. I have no idea what he might have done. But I would love to see his SOOC photo! The color palette, even though not my favorite, adds to the sense of mystery so I'm OK with it. In general, I lament what I see as a tendency to exaggerate in landscape photography. Too much ends up looking like a SciFi movie backdrop. This image is one of those.

minniev Loc: MIssissippi

Thank you on several fronts: for chiming in with your own well-stated thoughts, but especially for sharing your personal criteria list (I applaud you for this and feel inspired to come up with a list of my own).

I confess there is something unsettling about the image for me, too, though it may fall into the realm of plain old preferences. I have no bias against heavy editing since I will try lots of editing maneuvers myself but there is something that keeps me from loving this image.

srt101fan

I would be very interested in any additions (or deletions!) to the criteria list you might have! Regarding "heavy editing", I don't really object to that per se. It just seems like "overdone" landscapes are the norm these days. I might find the works interesting at first but it's not a lasting enjoyment.

jburlinson Loc: Austin, TX

Thank you for offering us this most interesting topic to ponder. I've taken the time to check out carefully the first link, which includes a video critique of the competition's entries and also a flipbook of the 101 winners (out of over 3,000 submissions). The flipbook is really well done. I need to try to figure out how to do something like that myself.

But -- to be honest, I was shocked. Well, maybe shocked isn't the right word, but I'm not quite sure what is the right word. Let me say that I'm not personally much of a landscape photographer, but classic landscape photographs were among those that got me interested in practicing photography and collecting photographs. Think Carleton Watkins, Timothy O'Sullivan, William Henry Jackson. As such, I was struck by how few, how very few, of the 101 winners were anything close to nature landscape photography, let alone representational landscape photography. Also, how very few monochrome photographs made the top 101; and even those that did border on duotones. The vast majority are impressionistic landscape photographs that are hypersaturated and heavily post-processed. I've no problem with post-processing, but, for a competition of this sort, I'd expect more than images appearing to have been run through Topaz's menu of recipes, with saturation turned up to 11 on a 10 point scale. Although Mr. Luen's award winner is not the most extreme example, it is characteristic of much of the rest, in that it aspires to a painterly like image (think Frank Frazzetta). For so many of these photos, including Mr. Luen's, the goal is to create a feeling of other-worldliness, walking the line between fantasy and reality, so that viewers are presented with a surreal impression rather than a realistic presentation of a landscape.

I don't want to sound like an old fuddy-duddy (although that's really what I am), and I can appreciate a good impressionistic or abstract image as well as anybody, I'm just thunderstruck that the current state of landscape photography seems to have rejected any other kind.

minniev Loc: MIssissippi

Thanks for joining in! I agree with you that the flipbook thing was a really appealing way to display the portfolios. I fully appreciate your opinion. There could be an interesting discussion about representational landscape photography and the trend towards surrealistic landscape photography. I confess to being torn. I like them both in different ways, but like best something in between the two with an original flair to it. I have no prejudices against creative or artistic editing, but I sometimes tire of the type of images I see on 500 px, which seem, at the risk of being heretical since these photographers are so much more skilled than I, to be unoriginal in style.

minniev Loc: MIssissippi

I think you've done a great list, and though my words are different, mine is very similar - I think the differences are mainly conceptual, having to do with how I see things (all of us have slight differences in our categorization schemes and the words we apply to them). Yours is neater and more universal; mine is pretty personal.

Beauty in the natural world including scenery, shapes, color, play of light, living and formerly living things
Beauty in man made structures and contrivances including shape, color, plays of light, geometry
Nostalgia - evoking memories. archetypes or history
Visual puzzles
Interesting interaction among living beings whether I know them or not
Scenes that tell a story or invite me to imagine a story to fit them
Stuff I just want to remember - places I've been, people I've met, events, loved ones (these won't necessarily have appeal to anyone else)

srt101fan

Thank you for sharing your list of things that attract you to an image. Yes, there is commonality between our lists, but you've got me thinking along some new lines. I like your "man made structures and contrivances" category!

I've also been thinking about my reactions to pictures that are positive or negative for no discernable reason. I think the subconscious mind comes into play at times....