-- Jim Harrison (hphoto@earthlink.net), January 05, 1999

Answers

Jim, The lowest 20% of the image ( brush and twigs) doesn't add to the image IMHO. If it were cropped it would help focus on the wonderfull web and the upper background that sets it off. Thanks for posting it up.

-- Micheal F. Kelly (Kellys@alaska.net), January 06, 1999.

Beutiful web and nice light reflecting off of the diagonal elements. Agree with Michael about cropping from the bottom.

-- Garry Schaefer (schaefer@pangea.ca), January 06, 1999.

Thanks for the responses. The shot was taken in Merritt Island NWR. The marsh was just littered with dew covered webs. Technical info...taken with 462 mosquitos and a lens shade. By the way, in trying to resize the image so I could post it here, I guess I cropped too much from the original. It has even more of those diagonal reeds with out of focus highlights.

Regards,

-- Jim Harrison (Hphoto@earthlink.net), January 06, 1999.

I think I would crop the entire bottom half of the photo as well as a little from the left. Center the web on the bottom left "third" intersection. You will get a lot of the reads as well as the upper right portion of the web flowing to the upper right. I wish I could find webs like this.

Cheers

-- Bill (Bill.Wyman@utas.edu.au), January 06, 1999.

I think more depth of field would help if the bottom was interesting.

-- Larry Korhnak (lvk@gnv.ifas.ufl.edu), January 07, 1999.

Interesting comments on cropping.

I think such comments need to be prefaced by a question: was the image intended to be art or an enviornmental study?

If the latter, I think the inclusion of the foreground serves to illustrate where this species likes to hang out.

Since in western cultures our eye scans from top left to bottm right by years of training, the web is instantly and obviously the subject matter of interest.

In my view, while not the most artistic view, it does serve a purpose as a good environmental portrait, if that's the right phrase in this case.

-- Keith Clark (ClarkPhotography@spiritone.com), January 07, 1999.