Cliff Dweller

Guy, while I do like this photo, IMHO it does not quite work. The ram is for me, anyway too small and there is too much hill in front of it. Also, the overall heavy blue cast I find distracting. I realize there are things you could not control and considering the amount of daylight where you are this could be the best image the situation would allow. Thanks for sharing.

Thanks for the honest critique John, much appreciated. It's funny, but I think I like the image for all of the reasons that you dislike it. I suppose my being there has a huge effect on the feeling evoked when I look at it, different strokes for different folks I guess.

Very different and very cool photo Guy. Very stark and somewhat mysterious landscape. The small ram adds to the mystery and gives scale. It would have been helpful if the ram had turned its head a little to more clearly help identify the animal species (although I get that the white color and horns are pretty diagnostic). Out of the box and out of the park..

Hi Guy,

This is interesting - not only the image but also how you and John are liking/disliking the image for pretty much the same reasons. I quite like the composition (including the layered "depth" of the image both the size and positioning of the subject in the frame). But the strong blue cast looks artificial to me (whether it was or not) and thus reduces the appeal of the image (at least for me). But kudos to you for wandering "outside the box" on this one...

Cheers...thanks for sharing this...

Brad

Guy, I like the comp you chose here & the sense of the animal in its environment. I might try to back off on the blue cast a little though.

Thanks for the input, always appreciated.

As for the blue cast... This is my first winter in Alaska, and I really love it, but what a change from the clear, sunny Colorado winters that I'm so used to. The sun comes up (up being a relative term here, as it just sort of skims the horizon throughout the day) around 10:30 AM and goes down around 3:45 PM, but a lot of the time you don't see it due to the heavy cloud cover. Most days lately have been looking just like this shot, taking on something that looks to me like a pre-dawn blueish cast. I can't tell you how many times I tried to wish away that blue, but it's just how it is, and I fear that now it's grown on me. I can easily get rid of it in post-processing, but the result doesn't appear to be "true" to me (does that make sense?), and I strive to keep my shots as close to the way it really looked at the time as possible. Thanks again for your help guys, happy new year!

Love it ! Conveys a great sense of cold. The curls in the horn are hard to appreciate in the small version posted and unfairly gives the ram a bad name for not posing well