In response to Steve’s comment about the red spot and the common positive about the blueness and negative about the blurriness, I took up residence last evening by the window and wall and waited. A series of exposures was required as I had but a vague memory of the original lighting conditions. Fortunately, a few came close.
I took the opportunity to make the blue a bit more theatrical and to emphasize the red spot in the window (a bag full of straps). I also cleaned up a number of distractions.
Is it better?
Jay,
The view through the window is inviting. I will come to your party.
But overall, I prefer the original photo with (1) its more generous layout that shows blue right and left to the stuff hanging from the outside wall; (2) the paler/lighter blue that confer a haunted, rather than ‘theatrical’ quality. Also, the pale yellow, seen through the window, adds to the bewitching quality of this first picture.
Jay,
Twice lightning.
Do you have a sense of what you might want this to be in its final form — that is, do you want a pure (not retouched) photograph, or something where the hand of the artist is more overtly present?
I agree with Birgit that there are elements of the first version that I miss in this one — the mystery and spontaneity of the blurred interior, the particular quality of that blue — but there are things I like here as well. I wish almost for the original blue ‘frame’ with the interior halfway between the clarity of bolt 2 and the fuzziness of bolt 1.
The image clearly is evoking something that compels you — can you articulate what it is? It has an undercurrent of “Whose woods these are I think I know” — that feeling of being arrested by the sight of something and pausing to consider it without quite knowing why or being able to name or categorize the arresting something.
Birgit:
The party is BYS (Bring Your Scruffs).
Some of my adjustments can be re- and/or undone. The generous layout can be recovered by resizing the image. The blue can be changed. And I’m not sure if you are missing a purportedly deleted pale yellow or praising its continuance. Last night’s photography took place a little more square to the window.
The contents of the window can be blurred and thereby mystified or maybe the wall can be placed a little out of focus.
It’s funny, because I was sure that the reactions to my alterations would be positive. Perhaps I don’t always recognize the best parts.
Melanie:
I want folks to think that the image is unretouched. In fact, this item has been heavily altered: cropped, the perspective jinked to make parallel a receding perspective, the color adjusted, the image compressed horizontally and a little posterizing thrown in. And I did some cosmetic touching up for good measure.
June has something to say about this in her latest McLoughlin comment. I used to jog in the evenings before my knees gave out, and it was intriguing to see into distant windows. To me everything is mysterious in a “it just is” kind of way and the enclosed tableaus that I passed were small wonders. I believe that the feeling of being arrested that you mention is very much in play here. With the possibility of sounding pompous I might declare that much of the artistic enterprise, in whatever medium, wants and tries to get at that feeling.
Part of what compels me here is the transformation that occurs at twilight: a time of day when spirits are about. A blending occurs as parts of the human world begin to wax radiant, a passing of the torch as the sun sets.
My work space is an utterly mundane gray outbuilding – a garage. A light was on and the humble structure was now brave and resolutely festive. Through the window my collection of tools and bric-a-brac became a busy pattern, set against a blue and moody collection of probing shapes.
Compelled? Nah.
My mistake, then. I thought that soliciting comment, returning to the scene and investing time and thought in refining the image suggested a certain level of interest. Sorry to misunderstand.
Jay,
Like Birgit, I find the lighter color and feeling of the first version more intriguing, more a sense of twilight or mist than dark night. It seems that fits what you yourself might be after. I love the attraction of the warm interior, augmented by the voyeuristic implication. What’s especially drawing me here is the very bright object, which looks almost on fire. I’m not sure if a Photoshop blurring of the interior would work here, but obscuring the view with a (partially drawn?) gauzy curtain might add to the general effect.