Members your views please

From what I read in his book the image was projected onto the screen as a still image, not printed in. I may have to dig it up and re-read it.

 

I think if you took a second look at Gifford's work you'll see that your statement is untrue. I recall a good number of Gifford's shots which, for example, use a game of football in the foreground, and by my reckoning football is about as relevent to railways as the cooked breakfast is!

Personally I'm not keen on the image. Sure, it's imaginative and different but for my liking it looks far too staged and artificial. I'm not concerned by the technical background to the image, but I'm puzzled by the narrative it's attempting to convey. By having both elements in focus, the two conflict and compete leaving me questioning what the focus actually is? I would imagine having the breakfast OOF would pull the viewer through the window to the train giving the image a much stronger impact. Does the image actually benefit from having the breakfast to be in focus? How about if it was switched so the train was OOF?

I can't help but feel there is something lacking from the depiction of the breakfast and that a more interesting sense of storytelling could've been achieved if the arrangement of the foreground was changed. Perhaps with the breakfast half eaten, or with different objects altogether. Just a newspaper and a mug of tea perhaps? Or going further, include a human element as a previous poster suggested. Maybe a businessman, ready for work, drinking tea and reading the morning paper, glancing out the window at the passing train. Again, this foreground cameo could be deliberately thrown out of focus to heighten the impact of the train.

 

Of course, but Gifford's shots had a context to them that this particular photograph does not. You could identify the people and the surroundings with the time the photograph was taken and it was taken in a way that made you feel that the railway was the subject of the photograph rather than some kind of add-on.

Apart from that, I agree with everything else you wrote.

 

On reflection you could be right but I know the image wasn't a "movie" image as such.

 

Your suggestion of throwing one element of the picture out of focus is an interesting one and if you look at this image http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=333539&nseq=2 the same photographer has done just that. Regarding your remark about a football match, I agree. One can easily argue that said match is as relevant to a railway image as is the breakfast. My opinion is this, there are views a plenty of railways through windows and there is highly likely to be something on the photographer's side of the window so why not try and include it? If it had been a young lad looking out at the train I suspect the detractors would have a different opinion. Perhaps as suggested by an earlier poster, the young lad should have been there as well as the breakfast. Like it or hate it, it's certainly more than "just another picture of a train."

 

Ahh - now when you put it in those words (which is different to your previous justification) your argument makes sense, and I can see where you're coming from!

Gifford's shots were more successful in combining sperate elements into a pleasing coherent composition, whereas I feel the shot offered here in the OP is too fragmented. I also can't help but feel that b/w would improve Coombes' shot too(?). In colour I find the foreground rather gaudy and almost like an advert for HP sauce as apposed to anything more artistic.

 

Technically brilliant, but I really don't like it at all; sorry

Regards