Selected by Scott Secco - I'm not sure whether I should be talking about POY at this stage of the year, but this is one of my personal contenders for sure... Wonderfully exposed and composed with stunning colours and you know that line if burly as shit.
it looks amazing, but my photo shop senses are tingling, ill be happy to be proven wrong but I'm pretty sure the rider and dust cloud have been added to the photo.
I'd have to disagree. I'm not sure what Brian Camp's post processing routine is, but all that looks to be adjusted here are the "levels", and a very slight touch of saturation.
So good! I suspect 2 exposures taken on a tripod and then blended to pull off this shot. Not sure you could get such a well lit foreground and perfectly lit sunset sky in one exposure. Nothing wrong with that though, really impressed with the final effect, not to mention the amount of planning and timing that went into this shot in a truly epic location.
I am pretty sure this is photo-shopped. The dust cloud looks very unnatural, it seems too opaque and ends too abruptly(it would likely continue up the riders line unless windy, if it was windy the dust cloud would not be so opaque), also the hue is very unnatural and doesn't seem to match with the dirt. Also the dust and rider would have a shadow since the sun isn't directly in front of him but far to his right, if the sun was i nfront the dust cloud near the rider would be in shade from the rider.
Still disagree. Coming from an area with very similar dirt all I can say is that the dust clouds look just fine. That and the fact that your accusations of him inserting such a prolific rider such as Kyle Strait into his photo is the equivalent of calling the photographer a fraud with no artistic integrity. I can't speak for the photographer himself, but as a photographer myself I know how much time, effort, and planning it takes to get a short even half this good. I can see what robb was talking about with the double exposure, but with a skilled eye it's not too hard to get this kind of shot with a single exposure. I personally would love to hear how this shot came to be and what techniques went into is development.
Hmm. Thinking radrider is on to something - was looking for a rider shadow myself. Unless of course the photog' wants to chime in and put the uncertainty to rest.
Who knows, all I can say is I spend a lot of time inspecting light, color, perspective, the things that make up our perception of view-able reality, so that I can try my best to recreate reality as photographically realistic as I can. And if this was a painting, it would be complete, except I would work on the dust cloud and add a shadow for the rider.
The first thing I noticed in this shot was the riders body position in relation to the terrain. It doesn't really fit. If he's pinning it straight (haha) down the fall line (hence creating so much dust) then wouldn't he have caught some air on that bump or at least be on the back wheel?? Also looks like a decent huck approaching below...