rosedaddy...thanks. If you were standing next to me to watch that sunrise in June 1980, I don't think you would have said that the wall is ugly. It is simply and utterly amazing.

Could you maybe put a dog in there somewhere though? ;-)

Did I just criticize the technique of King?? Good grief. Ah well, I certainly agree with you that the wall is awe inspiring.

Hi, Craig, and thanks for your comments. So you've been on the Wall? When? I have some good stories to go with this shot, some I can only tell in private.

I think I can see what you mean about what appears to be sharpening, but there is very little sharpening of this image. My hunch is that it is due to a combination of scanning with my little amateur HP S20, Noise Ninja (which has it's own sharpening artifacts) and resizing, etc. I'm still learning digital imaging and hope to improve in the future.

It was shot with Kodachrome 25 in sunlight (shortly after sunrise) on a very crisp morning with little atmospheric haze; camera on tripod with a very sharp lens set at optimum aperture for sharpness (between f5.6 and f8...no EXIF data on old film cameras!).

The funny thing is that the heavily-shadowed background is pretty much what you see on the slide--as if it were still night back there. I actually had to lighten the area of the wall you can see in the distance.

The contrast is what you get after adjusting the histogram, tweaking the Curves just a bit and adding 10% black using Selective Color. It was a contrasty image to start with.

Anyway, I'm crushed to read that you think it is over sharpened and too contrasty. I guess I'll just have to go back to China and reshoot this with modern equipment. Sigh.

@Craig...and don't worry about criticising me--I've been eviscerated by the best. Not only can I take it, but if it helps me to learn and improve my photography/Photoshop skills, even at my advanced age, I deeply appreciate it.

@ Ana - That was me with the remark about looking down on a city on some other image. I didn't get the same feeling with this picture. Perhaps some knowledge of the subject matter helps here.

King, being eviscerated by the best is one thing, but criticized by a rank amateur another. I suspect that the size has a lot to do with it - the shot probably looks great in a larger format.

I was there in 2005, and would have killed for a day without haze such as you had. Here is one of my shots, and you can see how hazy it is:
http://www.craigmartin-gallery.com/Album1/Great-Wall-1---August-2005.html

@Craig...I like your's much better than mine. Only a small section of the wall, north of Beijing, was open to tourists in 1980...much of it was crumbling and unsafe. The perspective in your shot is better as far as foregroun, middle ground, background. I like it very much, despite the haze.

@Montage,
Thanks for the comment. I promote you to Sargeant, W.S.R.P.! :>) Thanks, also, for incorporating the words, "although fantastic" into your discussion of Relevance.

The shot isn't about the mountains...it's about the largest manmade structure on earth--I think it still holds that title, except for the interstate highway system.

Folks, I get it. I know that simple photographs of big dogs, composites or not, shot to emphasize their bigness (to borrow Montage's word) will be favored over extraordinary photographs that don't carry the same "Relevance" (not talking about my wall photo here but I can't reveal the image I have in mind...one of George's in this theme).

Im sure that none of us want false praise or empty criticism (not referring to Montage's honest remarks here), but wouldn't we prefer to have our images considered for all of the five rating categories, and not just the first in line (i.e., Relevance). It's as if the other categories don't even matter--beating a dead horse here, I know.

What I find dreary and tiresome is when raters get so stuck on Relevance that they can't appreciate other qualities of an image that may have prompted the W.S. member to want to share that image with others--still beating that horse.

However, like others, I'm grateful when anyone takes the time to comment on an image, to offer their honest evaluation and helpful criticism, tips, insights, etc.

When I find an image not to be high Relevant, I challenge myself to find *something* in one of the other four categories to talk about and, one hopes, to appreciate. Otherwise, we're just grinding each other down when we should be encouraging one another.

@Craig...furthermore, I'm an amateur and a rank beginner at digital imaging. I know next to nothing about pixels and even less about digital cameras. I'm a big fan of your work and learn from you.

I know a bit about Photoshop and dearly wish it had been available when I was a working photographer...but then, the Internet had not been invented and W.S. didn't exist.

This is a whole, new world for this retired professional who has loved photography all his life. My professional years were just an interlude. That was then. This is now.

@Montage...you can't have valued some of the qualities other than Relevance as my Overall score went up after your ratings--thanks!

By the way, I encourage *everyone* to take a look at Craig's excellent photograph of the Great Wall of China:

http://www.craigmartin-gallery.com/Album1/Great-Wall-1---August-2005.html

...Why or Why doesn't W.S. let us edit our remarks?
Montage, I meant "You *must* have valued some of the qualities..."

King, you are making me blush! Seriously, you are very generous, and I consider praise from you praise indeed. Thank you.

I actually kind of thought this was yours King!
a little question I have why did you add 10% black to the image?
Ok, it might make it more dramatic (higher impact) but at the same time you loose information! I probably just should check it out on another screen than on my low lit laptop...

Craig,

You are most welcome.

One of the things that my friends know about me is that I am a very supportive person.

But, as an artist among fellow artists, I also strive to be honest with my point of view: if I don't like something, I will tell you, if you really want to know. The flip side includes praising the work of others that is superior to my own (in my opinion).

ChriZ,
Thanks for your comments, and please do check it out on another monitor.

The image needed 10% (5% may have been adequate) black because, as scanned, it had no "black" pixels.

I am working my own "zone system" for scanning and preparing images for screen display. Although some would prefer that no pixels be pure white (e.g, "hot" pixels), I don't necessarily agree when it comes to specular highlights (those where the lightsource is directly reflected).

I also think that it is appropriate to have truly black (0, 0, 0) pixels where it would be as black as possible, technically speaking, on a b/w print.

King, I did rate this high. Hence the "although fantastic" :)

A little bit more specific feedback (and not just because I know it's you now King, honest ;) The whole thing feels to me like it's sloping every so slightly to the left, and that feels a bit weird. I'm guessing it's because of the line of the hills and the fact that both they and the wall do infact head down to the left in the lines that particularly dominate the shot. It's not a big thing, it's just a bit of an odd feeling.

Also, since there's a bit of a dialog doing here, Craig, I really like your shot too and in no way do I think the haze takes away from it or photos like this in general. It's not haze, it's atmosphere ;)

Heath, I think the word you're looking for is "bigality" :P

Dennis,
You're right! I'm guilty of not paying attention to that detail. It's tilted about 1.5 degrees, and I'll fix that in my master file.

Thanks for the kind words and the perceptive observation.

Flatline...thanks. I arranged to be on the wall before sunrise and that explains the absence of people. As you know, probably, from having read other comments, it was remarkably dark on the horizon vs. the sunlight in the foreground.

Yup, saw that after commenting, and it makes sense.

Lemmingstone,
Thanks for the kind words. There apparently is not enough impact, sense of proportion, perspective, and I totally understand. Here are the ratings after 20 folks took the time to rate this:

* Relevance: 3.75
* Impact: 3.35
* Composition: 3.75
* Technique: 3.35
* Quality: 3.55
* Overall: 3.55

Not sure why the low impact ratings, it sure seems like a striking photograph to me.
N
Also, I didn't read all the above comments, but I don't find the high contrast to be unwanted at all. I like the ominous background and the wall seeming to disappear into the distant darkness.

As it is the only thing that really stands out to me (as far as constructive criticism) is actually the foreground. The trees on the hill to the left seem bit dark, and the majority of the foreground seems a bit unclear (blurry?). I'm not sure over-sharpening is the issue here. More probably, in respect to my own experiences using Noise Ninja, your problems are stemming from there. I have similar problems going from analogue to digital media, and generally do loose a lot of detail when using the program to compensate for scanner noise.

I do love your Kodachrome images in general, this one included... I can image it would look quite nice as an enlargement without the issues discussed here.

Thank you sir! I certainly wish I had a better film scanner, as the stuff I do myself is mediocre to pathetic, in my opinion. Poor me.
But my lab creates great scans.