I agree with all of the above. I really like the vignette effect. Not easy to do on a Zone 5 or 6 sky without lots of clouds. Quiet inspiration.

Very Cool. I'm curious as to what a shot would look like if the tree was directly in front of the sun.

Way cool shot, Clyde. Great in every category listed.

great shot!
and amazing silhouette!
the tree almost looks like it belongs in a dr.seuss book
:]

Great silhouette and light. Love your choice of b&w :)

very great comp, nice color
congrats

Great place for shootin'. It is botanical garden?
Try, some day, make this photo a little bit contrast in PS (level (poin of white & black)), also You can make it more saturationed!

This was taken at the Huntington Library Cactus Gardens in San Marion, CA.

This is a beauty. Looks like something from The Prisoner or something.

The backlighting gives a great glow to the cacti

Looks like a couple of aliens getting together for a speech by their leader... Great stuff.

Nice work on this, Clyde. Love the light and shades of gray that you have managed to reproduce in this shot. Cooool!

Jon

Amazing! Beautiful abstracts.

Amazing! Beautiful abstract.

Oops! Sorry about the double post.

I want to look at this as an artistic achievement (which it is) but I'm a bit phobic about this particular critter I'm afraid... It's so unclear that I can almost enjoy the picture, but then I read Ana's comment, and imagine myself being the tiny person, and I find myself running away again.

I don't think that's the cutted haead of his friend... I think it is it's own! :p

Tamara, you are correct. Only one fish here, ugh! At least he got to see his own end...

Hi,

I love the detail in the mouth. I would have gone for a major crop and come in on that mouth - a completely different photo to be sure.

Best,
jon

I agree that this is both a disturbing and interesting shot. Perhaps, though, I would like to see a little more of the "guts" side because the detail there looks absolutely fabulous. Well seen and taken.

I can't get my head round whether this is utterly beautiful or utterly disgusting. Very well done.

@Ambrosia: Thanks, I think I agree. This was shot digital and converted to B&W using Nik Software's Silver Efex Pro. Those plugin's do a really great job. I also have a roll of FP4+ I shot the same evening that I have not processed yet. I am anxious to see what the film looks like!!

@All: This is a good example of what you gain from 16bit raw conversions. The smoothness of the grad in the sky from left to right and the subtle difference of the tones in the light shafts would not be possible in an 8 bit workflow. I know the file size is huge, but well worth it, imo. I do all my raw conversions to 16 bit and I scan with my Nikon coolscan in 14 bit which gets output at 16 bit. I am in the process of adding more RAM to my pc and upgrading to 64bit Vista to deal with the heavier filesizes created from the new scanner and now the new Nikon d90 I just bought.

Very nice. Makes my eyes zig-zag back & forth down to the bottom.

Multy-layred mountains. Well deserved feature!

All those shades of grey...
I like that the bottom right is quite 'real', whereas the top left is dreamy, fairy tale like, with a gradual transition between them.

Wow, this is magnificent! Nothing needs to be said!

Very beautiful and the colors are amazing. I must say, I am very jealous of all the amazing JT pictures you are able to take.

Thanks Erik, it helps when you live an hour and a half away!! I call JT my church. It's where I go to recharge and talk to God without religion getting in the way.

The colours are amazing...
I also like the way the fern (?) breaks up the long straight horizontal cloud.

@Jan: Thanks! The plant you refer to is commonly know as a Joshua Tree, the namesake of the National Park. It is in the Yucca family. This is a young tree with only one stalk, examples of more mature trees:

www.vazaar.com/user:Beamer/photos/id:33257/
www.vazaar.com/user:Beamer/photos/id:29280/

Looks like the south side of Jumbo Rocks. The quartz monzonite had bearing veins of quartz but the pickings were scarce.
I know it's all in the time of day, but I'd love to explore the angles and curves of the place since the metal contrasts with the rock so well.

@John, this is just a bit north of Barker Dam about a mile hike from that parking lot. I didn't have much time to stay, we decided to walk out there on the spur of the moment and it was looking a lot like rain, so we didn't tarry... I plan on going back again with better light and more time.

Sheer pleasure seeing this shot. Great BW tones. Nice composition.

Looks like an intriguing place. Nicely composed shot, and the only thing I would add is that the horizon seems a little high on the right and maybe crop it in a bit on the left, thats being fussy though...Great work.

Abandoned mine, isn't it?
I think you a bit overcontrsat this photo. Lights are to light and shadows are to dark. But nice place for great photos and this once as sugject, composition and so on very great!

Wow. Single superb streak!

Touch of the Lord!
A bit overexposed in the area of the sun in clouds. In sych case I use HDR (-2;0;2) to show all details in lights and shadows and to save all colors!

Great panorama.
Beautiful place for a nice photos!
Well done my friend!

This is some excellent B/W processing!

A very good picture, excellent sharpness and contrast, great BW processing. IMHO the foreground is a little weak in this picture.

Excellent tonal qualities and composition.