Stills

I don't think that it is a reflection but that is largely irrelevant. I am approaching this from your usual standpoint that you don't like objects in the foreground to be OOF. Now, rules are made to be broken, particularly one's own.

What I think I see here is one guy looking out of the picture to the right and (possibly) a woman looking out to the left. The element into which people are looking is, for the former, white sky and, for the latter, unknown darkness but presumably another window. Watching is conveyed but dimly in the main although the woman (maybe man!)does convey more than his/her relative size in the picture would imply. In other words the whole weight of the picture relies on the more distant watcher. I think that it works to quite a large extent although the deadness of the sky somewhat kills the whole - some faint outline of treetops would have made it more complete.
 

I meant to ask which wildlife centre this is?
 

Rex, given we have been playing with titles and context recently, would it make any difference if I changed the heading to "portrait of Aunt Bria"?

John, it is the Wetland Trust centre at Llanelli (www.wwt.org.uk). The face is a reflection - in the open hide window, as Rex deduced. I don't much like the foreground - hence the dead tones. The figure to the left was brighter as scanned. Sadly I couldn't find an angle which both had trees and the reflection.
 

Yes it would have been different.

The image and title would then have conveyed a different message.

The title would have put a firm link between you and the reflection. It would have become a bit more personal/emotional. I would make the link between you and the reflection as that is the main subject in the image due to focal point and tone.

The 'Watching' title is (deliberately) ambiguous as the reflection appears to be looking/watching your foreground 'watcher'.

I am a strong believer in the title being part of the message, even when it says Untitled No1234. That to me says I'll give you no clue, make up your own mind.

Did I say I 'liked' this?
 

Rex,

Thanks :-)

I don't pay much attention to titles. Maybe I should adopt Matt's millionth roll numbering system.

I've been interested to see the discussion here about titles from time to time. I try to block title out when looking at a picture (equally captions in a book). Look first and read later. The 'Munch' title came to my attention because the word caught my eye on one of the comments emails. I went to that picture primed with an expectation.
 

I've always wondered if other artist who use Untitled ### are working from some numbering system or if they are just behaving like banks handing out starter checks; you never start at 0001.

I like the crossing eyelines of this. I'm not entirely sure that I get what is real and what is reflection, but I don't know that it matters.

I think I might want a bit more contrast or to see this on a white background or with a border; it blends right into the stills gray.
 

The subject for me is also the small, reflected, in-focus face and it is quite an interesting one. As Rex said, without it, there isn't much impact. Such a small portion of the overall image, to be so important.

Although I like the way the reflection comes out of the darkness, this image seems somewhat too dark for my taste, especially after coming to it from Matt's image of Kate above. There is a little too much featureless blackness for me.
 

I have difficulty "reading" this image, kinda of sinster feeling with the deep shadows and little detail for what is going on. The floating face also makes me feel a little disconnected.
 

There are triangles a plenty here to keep you interested in the geometry. I like the fore-persons shoulder-elbow-neck triangle which leads you straight through the shot. There is a lot of detail in those shadows which I assume look great in print but not so good on the screen. A simple shot at first glance but each time I come back to it I see much more...and that expanse of highlight in the main window is big enough to put any manner of wildlife in the back of my head.