NG Caption:Pastor Johan Geyser embraces multimedia to engage his congregation. NG Text:The church uses various forms of multimedia tools, from digital prompters (blue screen bottom left) to huge video walls on either side of the stage. The Pastor is followed around by HD Video Camera and spotlights. Power Point Presentations back up the message. Within hours, MP3 Sound bytes as well as transcripts and videos of the sermon are uploaded to their website. Church URL:Mosaiek
This is my take on a Photo-journalistic Image for a story as would be commissioned by National Geographic about modern day preachers, their tools and methods.
Shot in very difficult mixed lighting conditions. No flash allowed. I am very pleased with the balanced exposure.
As per NG's website, they only accept dodging and burning, cropping, HDR using bracketing and stitched pano's, all I have done here is crop, resize and Smart Sharpen (because it's published to the web), save for web. Anything entered here not following those rules is DNMC.
NG "Your Shot" Photo Guidelines, Rules and FAQ
As an example of non-wildlife work chosen by NG Photo Editors:
ETA: This is the closest I've been to brown in DPC. I know at least one DPC'er who will be grinning. I'm rubbing elbows with poorly focused or overly cropped images.
Thank you Jo (tanguera), the Yellow Ribbon Winner for (ironically) the only "during voting" comment (but didn't vote) and the 37 who recognised it as an NG PJ image. The 9 and 10 votes were particularly satisfying. Thank you. Pity the 95 94 who voted this below average (5.5) didn't back up their convictions with a comment. I guess their vote was as an indication of their ignorance as to what NG actually covers, and it's a lot more than just Prairie Dogs and Humping Frogs!
Statistics
Place: 107 out of 117 Avg (all users): 4.8333 Avg (commenters): 5.0000 Avg (participants): 4.5091 Avg (non-participants): 5.0649 Views since voting: 696 Views during voting: 262 Votes: 132 Comments: 5 Favorites: 0
Thanks for all the post voting breakdown. I accept that it's not in your face and that it suffered from that as well as a lot of people thinking it wasn't typical NG. No harm in that. But as with all the challenges the lack of commenting is what is, well, lacking. There were fabulous shots in this challenge and my vote average was above 6. I'm just sceptical of entering something that's bound to work for the wow vote only and not the "that's technically brilliant" vote. Sure, combining both factors is the way forward.
Your main subject is perhaps a touch blown, but again, that is the nature of shooting in such a venue. I guess the main reason I gave it a 5 is that I recognized that it fit the challenge, and that you knew how to shoot in such light, but it didn't wow me or connect with me in any way. The story that you saw in the scene just did not carry over to me.
This comment reflects my feelings on the shot almost exactly. I also gave it a 5. I thought it was a competent shot but it just didn't grab me at all, despite me being a Christian also. With the article you wrote it would and does fit perfectly but, of course, that was not available in voting.
I actually missed it in voting (sorry about that. I never got around to finishing), but I would have voted it higher than a 5 because of its particular interest to me, being such a church person. AND... having tried to get good pictures in my own church with no flash, I appreciate the technical skill involved in pulling off a photo like this. It's very nice.
I said I'd follow up this challenge with with some feedback for you, so here is the comment to back up my convictions.
I gave this a 5. I definitely perceived it as something NG might run, even though it's not the stereotypical NG shot. For a shot taken in such difficult lighting, it well done, and I have shot similar of my own to document an event, so I know the difficulties involved (I have some Taekwondo photos coming soon, good shots for what I had to work with, but the best would be hard pressed to pull in a 5 on DPC). Your main subject is perhaps a touch blown, but again, that is the nature of shooting in such a venue. I guess the main reason I gave it a 5 is that I recognized that it fit the challenge, and that you knew how to shoot in such light, but it didn't wow me or connect with me in any way. The story that you saw in the scene just did not carry over to me.
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