The 1st Photographers' Lounge Salon Challenge - WINNER ANNOUNCED !

Luke

Legend
Location
Milwaukee, WI USA
Name
Luke
Our previous Salon winner retow seems to have disappeared (hopefully nothing serious) so as a Moderator, I will start the next salon challenge.

Roger (ReD) has suggested the theme of Positive Negative and I think it is a theme rife for great photographs so will offer it up here for the challenge. The Salon will run for 2 weeks. While in general we allow pulling from the back catalog of great images you folks have stockpiled, I will require that every submission be newly created (your EXIF should show that you shot it after September 1, 2014) for this Salon (to motivate you to get up, go out and shoot).

Also, I didn't win the last one so I don't feel qualified to preside over the Salon. So again, breaking from tradition, this one will be voted upon by members of the forum. Entries to the Salon must be before the end of the day on the 17th. Voting will take place over two days and the winner will be announced on the 20th. The winner is responsible for starting the next Salon Challenge.

And remember, the only ones who do not win, are those who do not challenge themselves and enter a photo. Good luck and have fun shooting. I'm looking forward to your submissions. :clap2:
 
negative.jpg
 
Positive/Negative - Light/Shadow

I thought about this theme - Positive/Negative - for quite awhile....and just came up empty. I couldn't visualize a thing. Then today I was driving by an old 19th century cemetery/graveyard in the neighboring town of Ashland, Oregon - and I had a flash that at least on a symbolic level, there's a relationship between positive/negative ... and life and death. I think my frame of mind was a little influenced by the impending death of a close and dear relative. Mortality has been on my mind lately. So I got out and wandered between the trees, going in and out of light and shadow. And taking a few photographs.

And thinking about the dichotomy between two seemingly opposite poles - positive/negative - life/death - light/darkness. And remembering how, to paraphrase a Tai Chi teacher I used to study with, the one always seems to turn into the other - and back again.

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I am the vine, you are the branches
by La Chachalaca Fotografía, on Flickr

The text, a paraphrase of a biblical quotation, reads: "I am the vine; you are the branches"
 
- x - = +

Today I found an old unfinished oil painting stashed in a carrier bag in the attic room. It must be at least 25 years ago since I became disheartened & gave up on it as a bad job. Originally in colour with unfinished bare patches and a few pencil strokes.
I thought I’d photo it & see what a negative version looked like. It soon became a lot more than that after applying numerous tweaks. Making something positive out of a negative thing... Making a negative out of a positive… Then combining them all together. Then …

So for the time being this is the Positive Negative submission from me (it may change again) & its so very far removed from its origins its become a new identity.



 
I too struggled with the concept for a while. Then I decided to take it literally and combine both a positive and a negative image in 1 shot. In this shot, the left half of the tone curve is negative while the right half is positive (the tone curve is thus a 90 degree V shape starting at the top left corner, going to the center and then back up to the top right corner).

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pos/neg by bartjeej, on Flickr
 
Ok, this is simultaneously something old and something new. The old is the negative. This is a medium-format (approximately 2.5" x 1.5") photo of my great uncle Arthur. As a boy, he came across a disused farm, Moulton Mill, in Northamptonshire. It was old - very old - mentioned in the Domesday Book. As a young man he raised the money first to rent and then to buy the land and buildings. When I was a small boy I spent endless Summers there, learning to shoot (with a tiny "rat gun") and rowing around the millpond with my great-uncle.

I think this photo dates from the 1920s. It has lain with a handful of other negatives in my grand-dad's "diddy box". He died in 1973 and I have never really looked through these things before. There are many negatives, and I shall try to revive others, but for now here is my first attempt - Arthur clearing the land.
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Third try par Lightmancer, on ipernity
 
OK, I am officially retracting my first submission since it seemed a bit off in intention. This is my new offering. It think the negative/positive theme is better realized in this image because it seems to have a 3D presence. I can imagine this fella walking around causing innocent bystanders to goggle and shift uncomfortably. A hollow letter man.
Taken with the Coolpix A and post processed using snapseed.

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Letter Man by donlaw200, on Flickr
 
OK, I am officially retracting my first submission since it seemed a bit off in intention. This is my new offering. It think the negative/positive theme is better realized in this image because it seems to have a 3D presence. I can imagine this fella walking around causing innocent bystanders to goggle and shift uncomfortably. A hollow letter man.
Taken with the Coolpix A and post processed using snapseed.

15258833112_47d5c40dac_b.jpg
Letter Man by donlaw200, on Flickr

Fantastic image, Don. And beautifully processed.
 
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