This is my first shot at one of these contests Hope you guys like it!

Great idea, think the guy holding the book can't read to well with his hair hanging in his eyes, but nice shot, and goodluck.

Norm

Great image Rian. You have in interesting style. Nice work.

Regards,
Sorin C. www.sorinphoto.com

Rian, I'm trying to figure out why it looks flat or almost like a painting?

that will be hard to beat. It is somewhat of a tough subject to get creative with and I think this photographer did just that, got creative. Taking a photo of a book is pretty simple, getting creative to expand from that "book" takes imagination.
The very large book works and the creative lighting looks good, overall nice composition.
Nice shot and I don't think it looks "flat" at all. It looks more "soft" than "flat" and it works with this, kind of a "mist" feel to it with an old mystic tone.

Happy New Year

Maybe it's just me I saw Rian's work on his page and it is absolutely amazing. There's just something about this one. Oh well, it's just me!

Hi Rian,

I love the idea and generally love the execution. Take this for what it is worth--as others clearly disagree--for me, I find the processing overly stylized. But stick to your own vision.

Cheers,

Steve S.

wow thanks everyone! i didn't expect to get comments on it


rian

I knew this was yours without even looking at the name.

Rian,

nothing is over stylized here and don't think there is such a thing when it comes to ones own art work. Those that choose to like it will, those that choose to not like it won't. Looks like more like it and the sum of the total only matters in the end, I like it.

peace

I really like the composition - very creative.

Did you use the LucisArt plugin for this one? It has that strange dimensionality look about it - could be a still from a film like Harry Potter... Would be nice to see the original shot, because the composition is so strong it might work either way...and less stylised stuff tends to do better on this board.

it might look a little strange in dimension because no backlight was used to make it "pop" out more and give it that 2 dimension look. Too much light would have taken away from the mystic feel. It is what it is and it is very fine work.

This is a Winner!! Fantasticl Light! Love everything about it! Should be an Album Cover.

Congrats!!

Patty

Very well done!

Hey Rian, I just looked through your "behiind the scenes" web site and Flickr site. You're way overqualified for the WA!
It does look like your album covers, and that's ok. Good luck.

While I like the overall professional look and feel of thisone, I generally prefer photographs over overly processed images, but hey, that's just me! Good luck

suse wrote:

I really like the composition - very creative.

Did you use the LucisArt plugin for this one? It has that strange dimensionality look about it - could be a still from a film like Harry Potter...


Hey Suse Thank you No i didn't use any plugins. Just a bunch of layer masks until i liked what it looked like. try playing with multiply layers!

Rian

Steve Spencer wrote:
Hi Rian,

I love the idea and generally love the execution. Take this for what it is worth--as others clearly disagree--for me, I find the processing overly stylized. But stick to your own vision.

Cheers,

Steve S.

Hey steve, thank you Yes I usually don't process this much, but it seemed to work this time. I think I am going to redo this in a commercial setting. This was like 15 minutes of shooting and about 1 hour of editing haha

Rian

Very good pic. Great idea and execution. The only thing that bugs me is that the man in the center is looking straight at me and not down to the book.

Happy shooting,
Yakim.

I know this is your style, and I like the drama of this image, but the PP is bit over the top for my tastes. With less contrast, and distorted skin tones...this image would be much more powerful. In fact, grayscale would even work better for me. Sorry, just being honest. I do like your style in some of the other images you have on your site...

Very creative. I agree with James; for the WA my tastes run more towards photography and less artsy composites, but that's just my taste (and I'm a graphic designer who has done lots of art and lots of composites!)... I limit myself to photography here because there are tons of forums for digital art whereas I'm here to do photography. It's cool though!! :-)

you know whats funny, most of my work are composites, but this one is just a good old photograph

Not your best work but it got my vote