Raven Falls
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lukeb wrote:
My beef is, there is no misrepresentation on his web site.
What he says is: "I have spent years trying to perfect this image, there are so many variables you don't even think about. It's a really touchy image, but when it all lines up, the result is out of this world… literally. I have drawers full of transparencies that I have shot over decades that just didn't cut it. I tried all the variables--different lenses, exposures, compositions, times, then much to my frustration the results back from the lab were always disappointing."
So, the man is clearly saying he has "spent years trying to perfect the image" and, [he] "tried all the variables," and "the results back from the lab were always disappointing." There is no representation of authenticity.
There are no elements of dishonesty, fraud, or misrepresentation - accordingly his captures are just his form of art. The worst that can be said is his puffery is over the top, but it can't be considered anything more than puffery.
Those that don't like it need not look at it. But to accuse him of the things I have seen on the board could be considered actionable. Blow too much hot air up his skirt and he may just have you in court - its been done successfully by others. Including re-publishing a copyrighted image without express written permission.
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Nice job of avoiding what's right in front of you. (Psychologists call this "the elephant in the room syndrome.") While you parse the beginning of Lik's account, you avoid commenting on the key part of Lik's purple-prose "account" of capturing the image:
I was white-knuckled as I set up the mammoth lens, filling the viewfinder with this balanced scene, the tree framed amongst the rocks and the low lying clouds added to the tension… this had to work. The desert silence was stunning, my pulse raced, I could hear the blood running through my veins. Then, I saw the horizon starting to glow. The golden sphere slowly rose in front of me. I was totally stunned. I couldn't believe it. So connected to this lunar giant that I was trembling. Such an impact on my life. I pressed the shutter, a feeling I'll never forget. The moon, tree, and earth....Show more →
Lik is flat-out saying that the image he is presenting is precisely what he saw through the viewfinder -- that he framed the tree, rocks, and clouds, and "pressed the shutter" once the moon rose from behind the horizon and filled the viewfinder. Put simply, this is a bald-faced lie, as can be seen from a cursory glance at the image -- a photograph made according to his description would not have the "low-lying clouds" behind the moon, nor would they have the dark side of the moon darker than the surrounding sky, nor would they have the dark crescent in the wrong place on the moon for the Utah desert.
Lik almost certainly took a photograph of the horizon, tree, clouds, etc., then took another picture of the moon at a different time, and composited them together. He certainly didn't have that moment of apotheosis he so breathlessly describes, unless it was in front of his computer at home rather than through the viewfinder in the field. You can spin it any way you want, but those are the facts.
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