
“Sail away, sail away, sail away…”. If you did not immediately understand the reference, it is from Enya’s song, Orinoco Flow (Sail Away). Do you hear it now too while looking at “Orinoco Flows”? Using my Macbook’s Apple Photos App, I cropped my original photo and changed the photo filter to create “Orinoco Flows”. It creates a completely new story separate from the original photo, which evokes a sense of travel and exploration to me. I use the rule of thirds to create negative space on the left of the image to emphasize the boat sailing away towards the right end of the image. I also set the horizon on the bottom horizontal line grid, which is best used when shooting sunset photos. I placed the Sun as a point of interest in the power point where the upper horizontal line grid and right vertical line grid intersect. Lastly, I changed the photo filter to “Dramatic Warm” to enhance the shadows from the ocean ripples and add an overall yellow tint to infer the sunset just before dusk.

After looking through hundreds of recent digital photos in my iPhoto library, the sail boat in the background of a babymoon photo caught my eye. The intent of my original photo was to capture my beautiful wife with the sunset behind her while we were enjoying our sunset cruise out in the ocean in Key Largo. I don’t even recall seeing that particular sail boat while taking this picture. I’m really amazed at how a simple cropping and photo filter tweak can create a completely new story from within the same photo. Now, is it just me or do you also still hear Enya’s song in your head? Sorry, not sorry.
Hello Jason,
First of all I do love your original photo! It does evoke a sense of adventure on the high seas with your wife. I also find it amazing that something that was such a small part of the original photo makes such a great photo on its own, and evokes such a vibe of peaceful sailing through warm waters.
I love how you explained how you used the elements of photography that we learned about in class, like the rule of thirds and using negative space to your advantage.
Hi Jason,
I appreciate your attention to detail when talking about editing your photo to fit the rule of thirds! Your crop entirely changes the story of the photo, and like you mention, adding the negative space indicates the boat is moving out of the frame. I love that you also moved the sun and the light from the sun to off center on the right hand side. My eyes were immediately drawn to the sun! Your cropped photo creates a sense of wanderlust, while the original (which is also cute!) gives more of the sense of a vacation! Great job!
Hi Jason!
I love the contrast between the two photos. In the first photo, your wife is so happy and glowing. It creates this loving lens in which to see the photo. The second photo, however, tells a more lonely story. To me, it seems almost as if this person is alone, just sailing wherever the wind and sea takes them. The first picture having tons of light and love and the second picture having a sailboat in the ocean makes the change so dramatic, adding a certain loneliness to the picture.