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The Ringleader


The Ringleader
Photo Information
Copyright: Mimi Samuel (mimi) Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 398 W: 337 N: 272] (2299)
Genre: People
Medium: Color
Date Taken: 2002-06-27
Categories: Daily Life
Camera: Olympus Stylus 115
Photo Version: Original Version
Theme(s): African Life & People [view contributor(s)]
Date Submitted: 2003-11-16 19:51
Viewed: 1984
Points: 5
[Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note
I know this is a typical cute kid shot, but I liked it for two reasons. First, in every small town and village that we went to in Tanzania, we were surrounded by kids who were fascinated with us. Most of them were very curious, but very shy. Inevitably, though, there would be one boy, usually about 10 or 11 years old, who was brave enough to approach us and drag his friends along with him. It's fairly obvious that in this case it's the boy in the back row. Secondly, there's a good learning-about-the-world-through- photography story. Mikandani is a small town in the south of Tanzania. In the heyday of the Swahili empire, it was a major port city, but now the port has moved to Mtwara (about 10 km to the south), and the town has deteriorated. But, because it still maintains some examples of classic Swahili architecture, there are a couple of pictures of the town in the Tanzania Lonely Planet. By the end of a few hours in this town, I had a load of people (mostly kids, but some adults) surrounding me, passing the LP around. They were amazed to see photos of their town along side such famous places Dar es Salaam, Kilimanjaro, the Serengeti, and Zanzibar.

On the techical aspect: I scanned the photo and made the auto-adjustments. The boys' faces were very dark, so I did a contrast mask (my first one!).

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To Maciejmimi 1 11-16 21:50
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Critiques [Translate]

Kids are great, they seem to have a international language all onto themselves. Natural entertainers.
I really like the effect to have achieved with the image and the story line is also great. Off to look & learn with more of your photo's.

great scene and the story... all those boys looking at you and the the one at the back much taller ;) or jumping, cought in the air... but your scanner is not as good as the photo, also due to PS processing picture looks flat and a bit not natural. still very nice daily scene.

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  • mdchachi Gold Star Critiquer/Silver Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 496 W: 15 N: 194] (1603)
  • [2003-12-03 11:13]

This shot has an almost hand-tinted look which is appealing but doesn't look natural. A common side effect of contrast-masking is the halo that you see next to dark/light boundaries. I'm no expert on the technique but to minimize this I play around with the granularity of gaussian blur as well as adjust the opacity of the contrast mask layer. I may also zoom way up and burn (darken) the halo so that it blends back in to the shot.

i must say the expressions of joy and curiosity showed very well here. Somehow, the touch ups made gives me the feeling that the people were pasted on. Look at the other side, it is artistic. Kudos.

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