If you could travel beneath the surface of the ground from this point near the Greenbrier Entrance to Great Smoky Mountains National Park, you would discover that this thin outcrop of Roaring Fork Sandstone is actually the tip of a lithic iceberg hundreds, if not thousands of feet thick. Where it does outcrop across a streambed it creates some amazing erosional patterns and forms and sculpted waterpockets which allow for intriguing reflection images. The entire Greenbrier section is a fascinating cove of plant-life and rock throughout the year.
A focal length of 28mm, medium wideangleland, gave me the angle-of-view I wanted, looking directly upriver from behind the outcrop. An aperture of f/20 provided depth-of-field, and ISO 200 gave me a shutter speed of 1/8th second, fast enough to create texture in the water coming over the drop and a medium overall exposure.
I can only imagine the sadness that tore at the hearts of those Greenbrier settlers forced to sell and leave their homes so that the Park could become a reality. I am grateful for their sacrifice that allows me to walk in their places of beauty.
Good morning, Don, and thank you for the brief natural history. It gives wonderful context to your image knowing about “this thin outcrop.” Two things about your image raise questions for me. First, is the tuft of green in the lower L to anchor the eye or something else? And, I’m curious about exposure. The image feels overly bright to me, though I recognize it’s probably rendered differently on every device. The swooping rock forms are lovely.
I had the joy of spending eight hours last week in Portland’s Japanese Garden, a masterpiece of art and heritage that benefits mightily from its wet climate. With ample time, I could slow down, reflect (your advice), and pre-visualize carefully. The super-saturated greens posed a little challenge, but the surprise vistas and traditional motifs just kept giving and giving. A treat that made hauling tripod and gear cross-country worth it! Ray
Ans another good morning to you, Don. Seeing this image gave me an immediate flashback to being there with you. What a wonderful place that was and is. Ray’s comment on the green growth in the lower left made me immediately stop and look for myself. Very unobtrusive, never caught my eye that much. As to the brightness, yeas, various devices will render it differently, and for me it was not a concern. Thanks for the beautiful image and the great memory.
Very nice image. My eye wants to start at the top and come towards the bottom of the frame and exit on the lower right. I really like that you included the rocks in the foreground. To me, they are the star of the shot. Two alternate ideas. First, my personal preference would be to darken the overall exposure by 1/3 to 1/2. At the very least, darken the trees at the top and the base of the waterfall. Second, I would consider cropping off more of the trees and make it more about the waterfall and rocks in the foreground. That is the beauty of photography, each artist sees it differently, and no one version is right or wrong.
Good morning Everyone. Thank you all very much for joining me for this conversation. It’s been a busy week in these old mountains. On Tuesday Bonnie and I managed a 4.9-mile hike up one of Mount LeConte’s less well-known trails, The Bull Head, to do images for a fall-issue article of Smokies Life, the publication of the Great Smoky Mountains Association. The article chronicles the aftermath and botanical recovery of the Park in the wake of the great fire of November, 2016. We documented some amazing facts about the past two-and-a-half years of post-fire plant life.
Hey Ray. First, I’m delighted to hear about your Oregon adventure. We have not visited Portland’s Japanese Garden, but it sounds like a wonderful place. And I honor your following in the flow of time to take advantage of the wonders it reveals. Would that such a flow were the daily substance of our lives in general, but the world seems only to want to accelerate. Now to your question about composition. The tuft of grass was a tricky consideration. If I included more of it, there were elements that came into the frame elsewhere that were very distracting. If I included less, there were things eliminated from the frame that seemed essential to what I wanted to express. The grass was growing in the rock, as often happens; and I could either use it, pluck it, or remove it digitally. I decided to leave it. And the question about brightness…Even though I arrived at the river about 8:00 a.m., the sun had already nearly climbed above the forest to the left, lighting the bank on river left, as you see looking upstream. I thought about darkening the exposure, but decided it would deepen by too much the shadows under the foliage on river right. Actually the best time to be here is late in the afternoon with the sun reflecting off the river right foliage. In either case, the rocks are more open to the sunlight than the streambed going back upstream, which always makes for interesting light-management issues. Great questions; thanks!
And a good morning to you, Chuck. I hope all is well in the Mid-Atlantic Region. We are missing you, as always, and hope you are having fun with family. I very much appreciate your kind comments, even as I appreciate the merit of Ray’s questions. It is true that our devices don’t always reflect identically; and their uniqueness is as wide-spanned as ours, but we do strive for some common understanding in the face of it. Hope we have a chance to chat soon.
Hey Kev. By now you are enjoying the fiords of Norway. Hope you have a great time! I’m going to let you borrow this image to play with and I’m looking forward to seeing what you create. You are exactly right; the uniqueness of our vision is what guides our art; and without it, where would art be? Looking forward to talking soon.
Thanks, again, Everyone. What an enriching conversation. The uniqueness of our vision is the basis of all that informs us as artists; and the sharing of that vision is what compels our growth as artists. I truly appreciate all that you offer me as part of a creative family. Walk in Beauty.