Sounds like dbyrd. He seems to do mostly animals and nudes (my favorite is "Autumn Morning").

Thanks all for the suggestions. I was working on this at home when the power went out all over town (is it sad when you come into work at night, just to use a computer that's working off a power generator?). Anyway, I cleaned up the spots on the drape, and darkened up the background, and that improved it quite a bit. I tried cropping some from the left, but it left it kinda unbalanced. Phrank, funny you should mention moving the knight forward. My original intention was to use the scene for my tryptich. I had one shot of the knight on the far side of the board, the shot above, and a shot of the knight right in front of the lense. I was sort of playing with the idea of motion that someone had mentioned last time I posted a tryptich. The close up shot came out totally blurry, though, and my camera doesn't have a manual focus (our company profit-sharing checks come in next month. I'm buying a real camera!). Maybe I'll post the original idea, complete with blurry objects, just for fun. Mysnapz, I like the idea of the sky. That would look pretty cool. I hadn't really intended on doing that much post work to it, but I may play with it some time. Anyway, I'll most likely post the results in the gallery tomorrow. Thanks again for all the help! -Taltos

Hah! Very clever! I like it. My only suggestion would be to somehow blur the picture of the desk in one direction to give a sense of the top spinning. (Don't ask me how you would do that. I'm still trying to figure out how to build simple things in Bryce :-) )

I'd go back and shoot one of Jethro Tull's early gigs. Back before they got any sort of a record deal. Or my parent's high-school graduation. That'd be kinda fun too. -Taltos

Here's my take on this (and a couple of the other posts I've read this afternoon). The photo doesn't have to do anything for you, it has to work for the artist. There are a lot of "great works of art" that don't do anything for me. I look at it and move on. I don't bother to question if it's art or not. You don't (I guess I should say I don't. I can't speak for everyone. :-) ) have to "get it" to like it (or even hate it for that matter). As for Jordy's comments about having an explanation, I agree that explanation's are nice. It helps us at least understand the artist's point of view. I also believe, though, something that a friend of mine said to me one evening when I was explaining one of my poems to her. "Art doesn't have to be explained." As for the issue about the openess of the forumn that was brought up in one of the other posts, I have to admit that it does feel a bit closed. I don't think this is intentional though. Many of the people in this forumn have been here for awhile, and they are good friends. When someone new shows up, it takes a while to integrate. It's really no different than a child changing schools, and trying to make new friends. Sometimes they are quickly accepted, and sometimes it takes a while for people to get used to them. I for one, don't post much, because that's the type of person I am. I'm pretty quiet, and I don't like to intrude in people's "groups". I have to say, though, that when I do post, I get great feedback, both negative and positive, and it's helped me to at least look at things differently (and hopefully improve my photographs). As for CrystalWizard's photo. I like it. I like the colors, and the emotion that it brings out in me. My first thought was that it reminding me of the dead-hand piece that someone did a little while back (Jordy maybe?). Both works, although completely different, gave me same feeling of loss. In my mind, they both work. Wow. I've probably said more in this post than all of my previous ones combined! Just remember, you don't have to like it for it to be art. It doesn't have to make sense for it to be art. If you don't like it, or it doesn't make sense, look at something you do like, and leave it for someone else to look at the other stuff. -Taltos

I have to disagree with the pack. I like the first one. The color in the second one keeps making my eye snap back to the left. -Taltos

You said this guy is still alive? I couldn't handle seeing my head on a table like that...

Sounds to me like he tricked the camera. Kinda like putting a pieces of glass in front of a real camera. I think the way I would approach this would be to make two renders, one with the camera just above the water, and one with the camera just below the water, and then combine the two with post-work in Photoshop.

I like the sixth one. It leaves just enough to the imagination to be interesting.

Cool textures! I wonder how this would look in Black & White.

No worries Jordy. It must be a regional thing. I've never heard of the place either.

My guess is a not-so-subtley hidden camera keeping watch over a Wal-Mart parking lot.

Yup. Tried that. Attempted to connect for about 20 minutes. -shrugs-

Hm. I'm finally around when people are chatting, and I can't connect to the thing. Non-connnection to the chat rooms seems happen a lot. Is Renderosity looking into that?

I really like this. My only comment is that the water seems to draw my eye out of the picture, towards the upper right. On the other hand, the branch on the right keeps forcing me to stay framed in the the center. Gives me kind of an uneasy feeling (which I actually think is good for this subject).