An Old Tree +2rp

The tree has a nice shape, and wonderful tonality and texture. You might consider burning down some of the highlights in the background. This would definitely rate a return trip, Igor.
--P

Beautiful lines and shapes in the tree. My thought before reading Preston's comment was the same. The background highlights are pulling me a bit away from the tree, which is the star here.  Works nice with the iPhone, worth a trip with the big camera if you can. 

Some beautiful flowing lines and tones in the old trunk. I've got to think that shooting it RAW would provide ample opportunity to bring out  some of the  subtle tones of the wood and needles. I know my old Samsung III would not come close to producing an image of this quality. 

Igor,

I just love these old, weathered trees.  Makes on think what they have seen and experience for so long. They make me want to get close, feel the texture of the worn old tree.... and also look for interesting shapes, textures and patterns, that I can photograph! :-)

You've captured that well for me, which triggers all those thoughts about why I love trees (mind you, trees usually don't move and they don't argue or talk back.)

I particularly like the short pine needles and the random little sticks around the base.  In fact, this could be cropped to square I think and still portray the same.

Would agree about the highlights in the back; just a little burning to keep the emphasis up front.

Lon

Love this as presented but think I would love it even more with a crop from the top to focus more on the bottom. To me that's where all the great looking stuff is.

Square crop as suggested:

I did a 2 pass sharpening on the original. The second pass on just the tree.

The repost nailed it for me as it places all the emphasis on the sweet stuff like the weathered look of the tree and the scattering of the pine needles around the base. I think Lon said it very well. Nicely done, Igor.

Ed

The last repost best for me.
I would erase the tree on the left side.

Splendid Igor.  For my tastes, the original composition is best, by far.  The sharpening on the last repost looks slightly over sharpened on my monitor.  Somewhere between the original and the last repost would be perfect.  As for the tree on the left, IMHO opinion it actually helps the scene instead of hurts. It's an extra element that fits well but muted enough as to not distract the eye.

Thank you for your comments. To be honest I was surprised by the suggestion to crop the tree in half. The image to my mind was about as much about the flowing lines of the tree from top to bottom as anything else. It was the best feature of the image imo. But I made the crop to see what the reaction would be. In general, I would say that people are less enthusiastic with smart phone images. That's not surprising since they are inherently technically weaker.