Watts Valley Road Photo

Photographer’s Note

Watts Valley Road – East of Fresno, California

Scene
Spring is on its way. With recent rains the fields and hills are beginning to show some wonderful color. This is the Watts Valley a pastoral area east of Fresno and right at the western edge of the Sierra Mountains. The area is predominately grassland with scattered oak trees and dotted with granite outcropings. The orange flowers are called Fiddlenecks and the white flowers are called Valley Popcorn Flower.

Background
This past winter my wife and I finally moved from Lakewood, Colorado, to Fresno, California. We have spent the better part of last year working on our old house to sell. Since moving in to our new house we have been working trying to get organized. Today was one of the first days we had nothing on the schedule and decided to take a drive into the foothills and view the tree blossoms, but what we found were wildflowers. We talked with one of the locals along the road and he informed us that more flowers were expected to come out in the next 30 days. The blues, purples, and reds are next.

Bruno40, plimrn, pboehringer, leo61, gunbud, feather, npecanhuk, stego, dareco, crhieatt has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

Bruno40 (6440) 2009-03-03 21:13

Hi John,
Nice to see you back here, I was away for a long itme myself.
Despite the "unfriendly" sky, the colors are nice.
Well composed.
cheers
Jorge

devimeuxbe (55865) 2009-03-03 22:18

Hi John
amazinhg landscape with these flowers. Good choise of vertical cropping.
Well done
Bertrand

dumbo (4358) 2009-03-03 23:04

Hi John,
Really beautiful spring photo with lots of flowers and colors. Your photo is very sharp and I like that lonely tree in the background.
Good job!

Regards,
Eino

aadilj (17950) 2009-03-04 0:45

Lovely work my friend, its so idyllic and so softly compsoed with all the vibrant hues and colours. the dof is lovely and so is the eprspective

rikko77 (6014) 2009-03-04 3:00

Hi John, I like your compo here, it really works with the foreground in yellow/white and the fence to give depth. I really like it!
Greetings,
Rikk

Greg1949 (8507) 2009-03-04 4:13

John, its been a while since I saw you put one up but this one was worth the wait. The sky is kind of hesitant or in transition like the season waiting to turn into spring. The flowers are the color and detail and the fence line is great and rising to the left is a bit different than we usually see I think. Great capture.

Greg

Graymond (220) 2009-03-04 8:13

John,

Compo is good and I especially like the contrasting colors between the flora and the tree/sky.

plimrn (19602) 2009-03-04 10:52

Hi John,
Great framing; the dip in the fence and the rocks make the wonderful colors really stand out - nice to know the flower's names as well
We're thinking about taking a run to Oregon to pick up our tax stuff; looks like now is a good time - California's 15 minutes of green!!
HLJ, Pat

pboehringer (770) 2009-03-04 14:04

John, that is a very nice start to explore the surroundings of your new home. It seems to me that I came back from Argentina right at the moment to explore the flowers that are ready to explode in a colorful symphony. Lovely detail of these white and yellow flowers in the background and the old and denuded oak tree in the background.
Peter

BWJ (1771) 2009-03-04 19:12

Hello John,
This is a pleasing and well composed picture with excellent perspective. The yellow and white wildflowers are a welcoming sign that spring is not far away. Very skillful work. My compliments.
Kind regards,
Betty

vincz (19039) 2009-03-04 23:18

Back to TE after a long break I discover lots of great pictures in your galleyr. Really like this one for thecomposition with the tree and the fence. Flowers popping up bring great colours.

leo61 (43336) 2009-03-05 11:23

Hi John!
I can`t wait to see those wonderful colors of spring here again.a few more weeks....
Great POv and excellent composition with this big still leafless tree and the diagonal fence,which gives a great depth to the image.Very nice contrast between the white and orange blossoms and the grass in the foreground.
Regards,Leo

gunbud (27789) 2009-03-05 17:03

Hi John,
The old fence post creates impressive depth as it winds around the dormant fruit tree.
The lovely spring wild flowers and long green grass contrast brilliantly with the gun-metal blue sky.
Spring is about a month and a half away in my neck of the woods.
Regards, Tom

feather (49858) 2009-03-07 3:28

Me again! ;D
How wonderful to have so much colour already. Excellent composition from a low POV to make the most of the gorgeous flowers. You made great use of the fence and the tree is perfectly placed in the frame. Still no leaves I see!
Just got back from snowy Scotland!
Kath

npecanhuk (13713) 2009-03-07 3:43

Hello John!
That's a very interesting and truly wonderful photograph!
It has simplicity and mightness at the same time!
Pretty adequate sharpness and correct exposure! Colors are natural and beautiful! Low viewpoint was an outstanding choice in here! The composition is the real highlight, with the elements magnificently placed in the image! Those flowers in the foreground, the fences and the big tree are so good-looking in this image, all of them in perfect harmony! Very attractive and pleasant! I like it a lot!
TFS - Congratulations!
Best regards,
Neyvan

stego (22350) 2009-03-09 14:11

Hi John,

It's very nice to see you back. And you do it announcing a Spring view of early March that reminds me a bit "our Mays", except for the treeless oak (if it isn't a oak, it surely looks like one).

The compo is masterful, with the "brighter" FG field carpeted with those lovely orange and white flowers, the bent fence separating it from the rest and gently leading the eye to the silhouette of the tree, which adds to the stormy sky to give a touch of drama that makes a wonderful contrast with the flowers.

I wish I had half the talent you have to this kind of photo, because I believe that it's possible to get views much like this one on the region where I spend much of my free time.

Regards, José.

pablominto (40508) 2009-03-12 1:54

Hello John,

I like the composition, with the fence cutting the frame in the diagonal!
The field of wild flowers is an attractive element, the still naked tree is an eye-catcher of course...
Obviously spring is more advanced in other parts of the world, hehehe!

Greetings,
Pablo -

dareco (17104) 2009-03-29 17:29

WOW!!!! I love this!!! The truth is I wish I had taken it myself :) I would love to spend time in this spot, beautiful wildflowers! And the pov is perfect. This would look great on my wall! TFS

crhieatt (5143) 2009-04-07 2:42

John,

Nice to see you dropping in with the occasional photo! It seems - to me - you've been hibernating, waiting for the spring blooms to drag you from your den - and here they are! :)

Hope you are settling in to your new surroundings, an that you get a bit more "photo time" on your hands.

Cheers
Colin

brano14 (1870) 2009-06-07 12:16

Hello John,
I believe it is my first visit to your great gallery. Many great photos, I like your landscape photos and this is one of my favorite. nice low shot to capture all those colors and compensate for that dark sky.
Thanks!
Brano

fotka (141) 2009-07-08 16:39

Hi John,
It is a lovely composition with good perspective and wonderful colors.
I like colorful flowers in the foreground with the fence creating depth to the tree in the background.
Thank you very much for your critique. It will help me to improve my photography.
Best regards,
Zbigniew

Waylim (10741) 2009-08-23 15:50

Hi John,
This is a wonderful Califonia spring time image, I was sometimes still amazed by the tenacity of life in the Desert like landscape of California in the wild. In the city, it's hard to tell we are actually live in a desert area, if not for all the irregation many part of CA will be very much dry by June or July, as I can see driving trough some unpopulated area. But in the springs time it is fairly green and the hills can be painted with wonderful colors as you show here with specks of orange and white, while the old oak tree is still bare. Even in Death Valley is full of life in some area in the springs. Great shot here, with beautiful composition with the tree off to the side the attractive colors in the foreground and successive layers of elements lead us into the distant hills. I think the low light actually help you have with an even colors without too much strong shadow and light.
Thanks, hope it's not too hot up in the central CA.
Way