Mysterious Ways Photo

Photographer’s Note

"Johnny take a walk with your sister the moon
Let her pale light in to fill up your room
You've been living underground
Eating from a can
You've been running away
From what you don't understand:
Love

She's slippy
Your're sliding down
She'll be there when you hit the ground

It's alright, it's alright, alright
She moves in mysterious ways...

... She's the wave
She turns the tide
She sees a man inside the child

It's alright, it's alright, alright
She moves in mysterious ways...

(U2 - Mysterious Ways)

PS. I would like to thank everyone who has left their critique for this photo, and those who only had a look. I'm really sorry for the photo quality and grain, which is due to shooting with 70-200mm indoors in a poorly lit conditions (you can see I had to shoot @ ISO1600).

Therefore, I decided to upload another two crops of the original into the WS, where the noise is less obvious (and one of them is in colour!).
Cheers,

Robi

Dpbours, feather, wilkinsonsg has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

goodwill (4033) 2008-07-19 6:44

Captured beautifully, for family viewing too.
Three cheers for this difficult and fantastic POV. The nostalgia in the body language.....sings songs for this shot.

Well Done, Robert,

Rajeev

nels (2455) 2008-07-19 7:29

hi robert, she is a lot more agile than i am like the idea of posting it in b&w

adrian

Dpbours (220) 2008-07-19 8:25

Hi Robert,

A very interesting photograph. Nice pose and the black and white works well for me! But what happened with the noise? Some very strange noise patterns around the hands and arms. What happened there? That's a bit of a pity. But the black and white works for me.

Greetings!
Dennis

LamCam (3603) 2008-07-19 15:18

Hello Robi, Its a long time since I visited Sousse, but some things are still the same it seems! You have made a great job of this action portrait, catching the dancer at just the right moment.
Good choice of B&W - it draws attention to her face in a way showing the colourful costume might not.
Best wishes...Maggie

scalerman (25787) 2008-07-19 16:57

Robert: you've definitely captured something of the old Bollywood vein here - just enough noise to ad to the general mood of the image; good choice of BW. regards, c

Luko (13896) 2008-07-20 0:15

Could be a movie from the fifties. One of those lascivious egyptian dancers, when every north african guy dreamt of becoming Omar Sharif, before the whole of northern Africa fell into the religion integrism.
The tone is to die for, plus a dynamic diagonal, a truly excellent shot, Robbie.

rushfan2112 (2965) 2008-07-20 3:25

Hi Robert. I really like this. The low light and high ISO make it look like a still from a 1940's film - a very nice quality in my opinion. Been to Sousse myself but never saw this lass - unfortunately - as she looks like fun....!
All the best, Paul.

feather (50168) 2008-07-20 3:53

Having looked at the WSs I am wondering if you compounded the noise problem by quite an extensive crop. The artifacts on this one seem more like compression than digital noise, especially if you have re-worked a jpeg several times. Nevertheless the timing and framing and exposure were spot-on.
Kath

maria (2828) 2008-07-20 11:15

Hi Robi,
Love this pictures of yours. Her posture, that gorgeous diagonal, simply takes up the entire image. I don't mind (that much) the noise, having into consideration the difficulties you encountered. I really like it Robi. Excellent.
Had a look at your two workshops: I also like a lot the one with the wider crop as you can appreciate a bit more the length of her hair. However, the one with 'that' green is a no-no to me.
Regards,
Maria

toto (18767) 2008-07-20 11:37

Bonsoir,
belle photo de cette dame qui danse en se penchant en arrière, ce faisant elle forme une superbe diagonale dans le cadrage de votre photo.
Bien vu, bien pris.

Amitiés Thomas

wilkinsonsg (8646) 2008-07-20 12:22

Wow! no need to apologise for the grain, it only adds to the shot IMHO - excellent! TFS :)

Polonaise (5638) 2008-07-20 17:13

my only complain would about your positioning in there...
More to the middle of her belly and than shoot continuously to the end of the battery life !!!

:-)))

Don't worry about your corpse, after that...
The government of Tunisia's ALWAYS returning the dead bodies to their families...

Pleasant shot of the lady who obviously knew what she was doing - was she ???

Stay brisk, Robert... Keep smiling !

george

trekks (14334) 2008-07-20 19:16

hi Robi

Nice pose and capture of the motion.

The B&W and crop is fine for me but a pity that the noise, must be due to compression and re-working losses. Your WS looking fine.

tfs, bill

danyy (69499) 2008-07-20 21:40

Bonjour Robert,
un clin d'oeil séduisant à la beauté des danses orientales et aussi au charme des danseuses qui pratiquent ces contorsions aussi spectaculaires que..troublantes.
Un cadrage qui accompagne bien la position arquée de la danseuse.
Excellent usage d'une profondeur de champ faible, cela donne le relief attendu.
Regards.
daniel.

John_F_Kennedy (32032) 2008-07-21 0:33

Wonderful shot. Good photo! I love festivals!

Best wishes,
Achim

chicca (356) 2008-07-23 2:42

La danzatrice del ventre è sempre affascinante ed eccitante anche se, come nella tua foto, la ragazza non è proprio bellissima...

Hai fatto Robert a riprodurla in bianco e nero, ciò la rende ancor più misteriosa ed intrigante.

Federica

baba_flies (8115) 2008-07-23 6:25

Hello Robi! You got her just right and she certainly has her body under control. We are friends with a single mother and she has two pretty girls and one goes out with a young man from Turkey. So she became friends with his mother who gives belly dance classes. One night she was showing us what she had learned and she was wearing all the stuff with the little rings around her belly etc. and the funny side was my boyfriend, he was almost fainting and I guess she was not really aware how pretty she was (at that time she was 16). This was all so strange because they also live with their very aged grandmother (three generations) and they live in a very old farm house (about 300 years old) with low sealings and there she goes, making this dance with Turkish music. Their house stands in the Alps so there is no connection to belly dancing whatsoever.

So this came to my mind when I saw your photo, a great post, and I like the green version very much but the b/w is great as well ... Wonderful atmosphere ... we are right with her, trying to follow her dances. Barbara.

noborders (14201) 2008-08-30 5:22

This evoques so well the orient, the belly dances, the attitude is perfect and so is the framing...
I love every aspect of it !
I don't know who put it in my theme but this photo is really a success, congratulations !
Regards,
Cath.

pawelx (473) 2009-01-27 0:45

Don’t worry about the quality of this one too much – the expression on the face, the way you’ve captured the movement – this is what counts, and it’s amazing. Very well done.

Photo Information

Copyright: Robert Janovski (robiuk) (10763)
Genre: People
Medium: Black & White
Date Taken: 2008-01-20
Categories: Daily Life, Decisive Moment
Camera: Canon EOS 400D
Exposure: f/4, 1/80 seconds
More Photo Info: view
Photo Version: Original Version, Workshop
Theme(s): faces expressing trance & extasy in art, Breasts [view contributor(s)]
Date Submitted: 2008-07-19 6:39