Bur Oak Branch

Gallery: LandscapePosted December 6, 2012172 views10 comments

Saw this branch just hangin' out on a walk in late September on the west side of Nelson Lake, part of the Dick Young Forest Preserve in Kane County, IL. And it just amazing to me how horizontal it was, unbending and far reaching.

These trees grow very slowly and I've looked into estimating their ages based upon circumference measurements, and this one, and many others here, are probably over 300 years old, growing there when the United States was just getting started.

So I hunkered down and used my K-5 with a Tamron 17-50mm at about 35 mm with 1/200s and ISO 800, and handheld about five portrait shots that I stitched together in CS5's automate photomerge to arrive at this image.

Just getting into panos, so please let me know what you see that will help me learn and improve.

Comments

10 comments

Comment posted by Morris McClung on December 6, 2012 at 8:30 PM

A large version would make it easier to fully critique this, John, but I like the story it tells with the far reaching limb of this tree. Cool! And, the pano works well with the subject.

Registered on May 7, 2007, 670 Posts, 19650 Comments

Comment posted by Lon Overacker on December 6, 2012 at 8:30 PM

John,

Perfect setup for a pano! That's an amazing and stately old tree. What works very nicely and complimentary is the big sky and all those puffy white clouds. Only problem is the unfortunate side effects of viewing long narrow images on the web like this, a larger version is always helpful for these panoramics. But regardless, good job with this. No nits.

Lon

Registered on November 24, 2006, 521 Posts, 19147 Comments

Comment posted by Richard Teller on December 6, 2012 at 9:26 PM

This is an interesting branch and comp. It is very hard to evaluate the image without a large version, especially in a pano.

Registered on August 23, 2010, 1162 Posts, 6692 Comments

Comment posted by Rudy Ruberti on December 6, 2012 at 10:04 PM

Love the way these trees do that. The blue sky and white clouds make a nice background.

Registered on October 28, 2008, 179 Posts, 1875 Comments

Comment posted by Pat Sampson on December 6, 2012 at 10:12 PM

Great match between the aspect ratio of the pano and the shape of the limbs John. So, very strong comp and an excellent exposure for my tastes. Like the others, I wish I could see more detail in this but based on what I can see, it looks very good. Warm agreeable mood as well.

Good luck with your panos, I'm trying to learn to do them also.

pat

Registered on May 19, 2007, 953 Posts, 15989 Comments

Comment posted by Rick Turner on December 6, 2012 at 10:44 PM

Nice tree and good pano

Registered on February 18, 2012, 534 Posts, 2755 Comments

Comment posted by John Clulow on December 7, 2012 at 1:19 PM

Thanks for the comments everyone. I'll see if I can figure out if a large version can be added, and if I can, I will.

Registered on November 1, 2012, 155 Posts, 1079 Comments

Comment posted by Jared Warren on December 7, 2012 at 5:27 PM

Good eye here! Clouds and sky are nice for background. Foreground is a little distracting to me, but not much you can do with that and this was very worth the effort as a pano.

Registered on May 11, 2012, 84 Posts, 931 Comments

Comment posted by Nick Bristol on December 9, 2012 at 12:35 PM

This is wonderful. Great comp here John. The panoramic format really adds to the feel of this image. The beautiful blue sky and clouds work together so well with the dark oak branches and green leaves. Like this alot, and I will have to remember this pano comp next time I'm looking at an old oak tree. Might not be able to make it work as well as you did here, but it would be fun to try...