#42 - Test of Time (Congrats Ham)

On behalf of Bob Williams, this is assignment 42: Test of Time

This is a wide open assignment left to the photographers imagination. It could be anything from a portrait of an old man, an old tractor sitting in a field, an old house, old ruins or anything that says "I have stood the test of time"--Basically, anything old. Any processing method or treatment such as HDR, black and white, etc is acceptable I would like this to be new shots rather than ones pulled from archives.


The following photos have been chosen as finalists:

Name: Joel Eade
Motivation: The quality and style of the HDR work was very impressive---Detail in each brick, the trees, and the cemetery is quite impressive. The image of the old cathedral overlooking the cemetery surely indicates that it has survived the test of time.
http://joeleadephotography.zenfolio....62935787-5.jpg



Name: Conropl
Motivation: Love the long exposure image of the falls while maintaining perfect exposure and detail in the rest of the frame. It is very clear that the kettle formation took place over thousands of years and that these falls have not only survived but have grown unique with the test of time.
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8457/8...787c6387_c.jpg


Name: Ham
Motivation: This is an incredible shot. Everything about it just worked. The composition, exposure and post work are top notch. This shot is so dramatic and moving you can just see the wisdom in his face and the pain in his old bones. This fellow has certainly endured the test of time.
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-j...untitled-2.jpg



Name: Raid
Motivation: The subject and the rarity of the subject is what makes this shot so special. You can just see the age in this old guy and you know he has been around a long time. Seeing this photo left me wondering just how much those dark yet crystal clear eyes have seen.
http://i1046.photobucket.com/albums/...5_edited-2.jpg



Name: CLS
Motivation: Another fantastic HDR of an incredibly old building, Framing, exposure and post work are excellent and Details were well captured. The colors in the brick, shingles and surrounding trees and plants are very clear and vibrant yet still indicate the dark past this church as probably seen. I also Agree, the fellow on the bench just adds that little spot of interest to the photo. Almost 900 years old, I would say this little church has seen the test of time.
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8196/8...75ce6f54_b.jpg



Honorable Mention: Sheiky: Grandparents
I absolutely love this portrait and the colorization work is excellent. This shot certainly meets the intent of the theme. But, I am going to go out on a limb here and assume that Jan didn't actually take the original photo:). So, as much as I wanted too, I couldn't include it in the Judging. But very nice work none-the-less.

• The poll will be opened for 3 days, please vote.

Typical. I've got the best idea in my head for a photo for the assignment, I plan exactly what to bring (in my head, while I'm at work), I get home, pack the camera bag, walk the 500m out the back door down the hill, and when I get there the light's gone.
Oh well, better luck next time, probably the weekend.

But anyway, the reason I was late home was because I was picking up a film that got developed. Coincidentally last week I chucked in a roll of B+W, screwed on the Yellow filter and went down past the Port where there's lots of nice old buildings and things (even more coincidentally, I was inspired to do that by people talking of going to shoot an old prison, I like the look of weathered old architecture a lot too).

So for now my entry is this one, these two look like they've certainly passed their test of time (although I'm not sure if they're very much in working order anymore):

http://croubie.smugmug.com/photos/i-...-tHwCDz8-L.jpg

I've just spent the last hour or two on it, trying to USM the sharpness back in that the scanner took out, and simultaneously blur out the grain, but I can't get rid of those circles and the '8' printed all over the film (cheap chinese film, for $2 a roll I thought it was worth a try). Maybe i'll have to go back past the Port on the way home again one day and shoot this again with the digital).

And there's no point shooting Medium Format without pixel-peeping, so here's an 800x800 crop of the original 7000x7000 (49MP) scan.
http://croubie.smugmug.com/photos/i-...-rqD5nXq-L.jpg

This definitely is an example of surviving the test of time. Construction of The Cathedral of St. Andrews began in the year 1158.

Too bad it's an image I took last year so it may not qualify for all the assignment criteria.

http://joeleadephotography.zenfolio....62935787-5.jpg

Shot this week. Maybe a streatch for the assignment, but this is a picture of something that not only holds up to time, but even gets better with time. The waterfall below is called "The Kettles" because of the perfectly round holes in the rock that forms the falls (my daughter calls it the puzzle waterfall). Over time the eddies in the river current would swirl rocks and sand in a pocket in the rocks, and over time the swirling sand and rocks would bore these holes into the rocks. So it not only passed the test of time, but time has also enhansed the falls.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8457/8...787c6387_c.jpg
Autumn at the Kettles Waterfall-0638 by westmichigan, on Flickr

WOW, Great submissions so far, I can already see that judging is going to be a difficult task.

Conrad, Those waterfalls certainly meet the intent of the of the assignment---

Joel, I re-read the rules

Quote:

---

I would like this to be new shots rather than ones pulled from archives

---

So it looks more like a request rather than a strict rule. So for the moment, we will leave it included unless are any objections.

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-j...untitled-2.jpg

Shot this today in Chesterfield with the little X10. Think it fits the brief on at least a couple of levels, but it'd be cheating to tell you why!

larger here: https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/1...81205039223778

Nice one, Ham.

Finally have something for the assignments...

40 years of marriage.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-rnWU3A34wp.../Scholz-16.jpg

The late Lonesome George the Galapagos Tortoise died this year aged over 100 years old, he was known as the rarest creature in the world being the only member of his sub-species alive.

Canon EOS 7D, 70-300L @ 300mm, f10, 1/250, ISO400.

http://i1046.photobucket.com/albums/...5_edited-2.jpg

I would have to guess that these three oak trees sitting atop this knoll are 100 yrs old, maybe more. This image was made near Folsom, Ca on October 5, 2012. In the gold rush days, the Pony Express ran through this area, as downtown Folsom is located a mere 10 miles away. The California Gold Rush began in 1849 about 30 miles away from this very spot. Perhaps these old oaks were even around during that historic era.

Canon 7D | ISO 100 | f/11 | 0.4 sec | ultrawide angle lens | 3-stop reverse GND

PS: If somebody knows how to convert this to the proper viewing size for this website, much obliged. Thanks, Erno

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ernogy/...ream/lightbox/

Attachment 1456

Upload the photo somewhere where you can right click to get the URL.

Then post the URL between [img.] [./img] tags (remove the fullstops).

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by erno james

I would have to guess that these three oak trees sitting atop this knoll are 100 yrs old, maybe more. This image was made near Folsom, Ca on October 5, 2012. In the gold rush days, the Pony Express ran through this area, as downtown Folsom is located a mere 10 miles away. The California Gold Rush began in 1849 about 30 miles away from this very spot. Perhaps these old oaks were even around during that historic era.

Canon 7D | ISO 100 | f/11 | 0.4 sec | ultrawide angle lens | 3-stop reverse GND

PS: If somebody knows how to convert this to the proper viewing size for this website, much obliged. Thanks, Erno

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ernogy/...ream/lightbox/

Attachment 1456

---

G'day Erno, when you upload a photo from your harddrive like your thunbnail image shown here, before you click post your "post" or "submit" place the cursor on the small thumbnail image and double click, an option page then appears and one of the options is image size just click large image and then post your reply.

The other method is to upload your image from Flickr as "Ham" suggested.
Open your Flickr image and select share.
Go to Grab HTML/BBCode, make sure Large size is selected and just below that there is an option of either HTML code or BBCode, click the BBCode option.
Then, single left click on all the code in the box to highlight it then, right click and select copy.
Then move back to this site and type in exactly this,
[img]
Then right click your mouse and select "paste" and paste the code immeciately after the square bracket.
Then directly after all the code has copied into place, type exactly this,
[/img]
Then hit "post reply" and your Flickr image will upload as the large size straight to here. Then as you know your uploaded image has the link embedded in it to take people straight to your Flickr page if they click on that image. Important that there are no spaces and you type it in exactly that format.
I needed this explained to me in depth and this style of uploading images with the square brackets and img and /img typed between them and the code copied between the two bracket commands works on a lot of other forums to post images. So once you get the hang of it it becomes very usable.
I have a Windows computer and that's how it works for me.
Cheers,
Steve

Three Oak Knoll
FIRST OFF, HUGE SHOUTOUT THANKS TO HAM AND STEVE (thanks for these instructions. Learning to shoot in Manual Mode is easier I think....)

I would have to guess that these three oak trees sitting atop this knoll are 100 yrs old, maybe more. This image was made near Folsom, Ca on October 5, 2012. In the gold rush days, the Pony Express ran through this area, as downtown Folsom is located a mere 10 miles away. The California Gold Rush began in 1849 about 30 miles away from this very spot. Perhaps these old oaks were even around during that historic era.

Canon 7D | ISO 100 | f/11 | 0.4 sec | ultrawide angle lens | 3-stop reverse GND

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ernogy/...ream/lightbox/

[img]http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8170/8...dac73b6d_b.jpg
Three Oak Knoll by ernogy, on Flickr[/img]

how about an old car in front of an old building

[IMG]http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8034/8...72f37827_z.jpg IMG_3317 by NickVitalePhotography, on Flickr[/IMG]

http://sphotos-c.ak.fbcdn.net/hphoto...66544377_n.jpg

The St. Charles Bridge in Prague, Czech Republic. Construction started in the 1357 and was completed in the 15th century. This bridge has easily withstood the test of time.

This one's from a business trip to Cambridge, UK. The town is crowded with medieval buildings and even though I'm not really a fan of historical stuff, It's hard not to be fascinated by the city. In some areas it feels like walking around in a Harry Potter movie.

The Round Church was built around 1130 (they say - can't guarantee that as a fact) and is still standing strong. I managed to find an angle with almost no people in the frame, but the guy in the foreground snapping a shot with his phone kind of disturbs the medieval scene. First I was thinking of eliminating him (in post processing - not in real life), but then I changed my mind. I think he adds a nice contrast to the image.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8196/8...75ce6f54_b.jpg

I'd love to know how people described old buildings in England, Wales and Scotland before J K Rowling got famous... :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ham

I'd love to know how people described old buildings in England, Wales and Scotland before J K Rowling got famous... :)

---

Maybe Robin Hoodish ;-)

I've reprocessed my shot and added a larger link.

Only two more days! Keep em coming:)

Tower of London

http://bimmermail.com/UK2012/Day%20Ten/tl30-sm.jpg

I might have interpreted the theme a little too much to my imagination, so if it doesn't fit the assignment just ignore it.
I don't have a newly shot photo, nor does it show old people. Well it does, but not in their old days. They are my grandparents. I tried to color up their wedding-images from over 50 years ago. They are happily married for 53 years now.

This is my entry:
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8045/8...22f1778e_c.jpg
My grandparents by Jan Paalman, on Flickr

Link to the original and a small explanation of the process.

Well, my work and the weather have conspired against me getting any new shots, so I'm afraid I'll have to resort to the archive like a few others.

This is a shot of the mountain Suilven, which is formed from Torridonian sandstone that is 1.2 billion years old according to radiometric dating. Furthermore, the paler grey bedrock in the middle distance is Lewisian gneiss which is at least 2.7 billion years old. I climbed it twenty years ago and I can tell you it's as steep as it looks. It has certainly stood the test of time better than I have.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8185/8...cd20e119_c.jpg
Suilven by Andrew Stringer, on Flickr

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Jon Ruyle

Nice one, Ham.

---

Just seen this. Thanks very much.

All, I have been very impressed with the quality and interpretation of the submissions. I have wanted to comment on many of them but figured that would be inappropriate since I will be asked to pick the top 4 or 5. That said, all of you have made the judging very difficult---Thanks alot and good luck. There is still time to get your shots in. Good luck to all,

Bob

Well, if you don't mind me putting in one that's a month or two old, i've just thought of a really good shot that I could be putting in (even if it doesn't fit my original intention of 'old and rusty'). it's hard when my computer is living at a different house to me (which will finally be remedied on the weekend I hope, and then the adsl gets hooked up next monday)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Dr Croubie

Well, if you don't mind me putting in one that's a month or two old, i've just thought of a really good shot that I could be putting in (even if it doesn't fit my original intention of 'old and rusty'). it's hard when my computer is living at a different house to me (which will finally be remedied on the weekend I hope, and then the adsl gets hooked up next monday)

---

Dr. C, Please submit, the more the merrier.

OK, well once again the photo gods have conspired against me (or maybe it's my own doing, wasted enough time last night before getting to this), but I managed to at least get one usable photo out of the lot (with apologies to Andy for stealing his geological idea).

This is in the Hallet Cove Conservation Park, about 15km south of the centre of Adelaide (it used to be surrounded by farmland when I was a kid, now it's bang in the middle of suburbia), this particular one is called the Sugarloaf for obvious reasons (well, they were obvious reasons 100 years ago, but who gets sugar in a loaf these days?)
There's bits of the park that are 600 Million Years old, some bits are 250 myo, this particular formation came out from underneath the last glacier 12,000 years ago and has eroded into this shape since. This whole park (it's actually fairly small, 15 mins walk end to end) is pretty much a Geologist's wet dream, it's the first stop on the Geology Tourbus that everyone does in first-year uni (both for my friends who did it recently, and my Mum who did the same tour 50 years ago when she was at uni).

So, it's not a nice old rusty building like I was originally intending, but here's my Sugarloaf instead:
http://croubie.smugmug.com/photos/i-...-bFpfMhg-L.jpg

(And the original intention when I took these was to compare 7D vs Velvia, I still haven't finished the roll of Velvia. Then I started mucking around with grad NDs and took a heap of brackets to HDR, but no time to get a good HDR, so this one is a single-shot)

Originally I wanted to photograph stone walls for this assignment, but those shots aren't really coming out as I would like. So, this was taken at "Castle in the Clouds" this past weekend, which is a turn of the century "arts and crafts" style mansion built in the lakes region of New Hampshire.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8474/8...5ae28f8e_b.jpg
small-9772 by kayaker72, on Flickr

Staying with the "wide" open nature of this assignment, the test of time is the beauty of the view framed by a historic building just as intended 100 years ago. Work with me, the shots of the stone walls really didn't work out ;)

Thanks for viewing...Brant

This Old House - - - Bodie, California

I think this shot better fits the theme of this assignment, but since it's an old one I can't count it.

[img]http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2466/5...a54a8d4c_b.jpg
This Old House. Bodie, California by ernogy, on Flickr[/img]

Thanks for all the input everyone! The finalists have been chosen, congrats and good luck with the votes!

Congrats to all of those who submitted work and especially those who made the top 5. Choosing the top 5 wasn't easy:confused:. I would also like to thank Jan for keeping our little contest going and for submitting the shot of his grandparents. Though the original photo wasn't his, the recolorization work was phenominal and something that will probably hang around his family for generations---Great work Jan. Perhaps we could get him to do a tutorial on how this is accomplished:rolleyes:.

Again, congrats to all the finalists and let the Judging begin.

Bob

Only one day left for voting, please vote everyone!

Bob, thanks for the attention to my photo. It still needs some finetuning, but after that I'm getting it printed for my grandparents. In "this" thread I described the basics on how it's been done. If you think there's interest in a more detailed explanation, I wouldn't mind making a tutorial. Just let me know:o

Congratulations HAM!

Good one Darren, Congratulations.

Congratulations Ham

Congrats Ham, Well deserved, Great Photo.

Thanks all. Very much! First photography "competition" I've ever won. My cherry is TDP's.

I've got an idea for the next assignment that I'm running past the man in charge, but it should be something that'll suit any style of photography, and could be interpreted in any way you fancy.

Kudos, Ham. Well deserved.

Congrats! Sorry for the late reply:)