Easter 2006.  After running around in the backyard in search of plastic eggs, the festivities die down and the simple act of blowing bubbles entertains us for a half hour.  I knew I wanted to get a shot of my wife Gretchen blowing a bubble, but I  had no real ideas about the image that I was trying to capture.

Looking back on it now, I’m surprised to see that I actually took 71 frames before I finally arrived at the winning shot below.

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I suppose I understand why this picture works on a basic level, but I don’t fully understand why it became my most popular image on flickr.  The tonality is pleasing, there is a strong sense of composition within the frame and there is a nice color palate between the blue sky, the white clouds, the muted human figure and the pink/magenta stick.  In the middle, and entirely by accident, lies the pregnant bubble with it’s glistening highlights.
 

If I could point at any one thing that makes this shot successful, I would assume it might be the tension of a growing bubble right in the middle of the frame.  The highlights and slight dodging around the bubble set is apart from the background to focus attention to the center of the frame.  I also personally like how the subject is essentially lit in a reverse-key, which seems to add additional depth on her hand.

As far as post-processing, this is a strong contrast to the previous shot in that only a basic set of enhancing techniques was used.  There was a bit of dodging and burning in order to enhance definition, sharpening to enhance clarity, and I also added my standard vignetteing technique that I’ve had so much trouble getting away from.

What I find personally confusing from a perspective of artistic technique and vision is that I had no intention of composing this shot while shooting, but in reviewing the frames, this quickly became the strongest choice of the series.  My only creative thought during shooting was to capture a series of shots focused on the bubbles drifting while Gretch was in the background blurred out of focus.  Each of those shots proved to be terribly boring and they were all dismissed out of hand.  The lighting on the remaining frames was far too flat, and this final shot was instantly the most distinctive of the bunch due to both the size of the bubble and the reverse key lighting.  

While the first image in this analytical three part series was created essentially in post production, this image is unique in that it was created purely from persistance.  While those 70 other snaps did not strike me as anything special, this one combination of lighting and composition made this frame stand out completely from the rest.

I wonder if other photographers approach a subject with such a general sense of exploration, or if most good artists have a deliberate idea of the composition they’d like to achieve before opening the shutter.  Or are they much more inclined to work as I do, in a war of creative attrition, snapping shutter after shutter until the right combination appears in the frame?

Up next, I will explore “Up, Down”, an example of the right shutter at the right time.