It's -15C here in Denver, a nice triple espresso by my side. A big thank you for the entries and to everyone who participated and to all who enjoyed the images. Literally my first contest-setting and judging and a theme with a lot of latitude and subjectivity. It was fun and also a challenge to do. Here goes...
@oblomow - I laughed out loud when I saw this and indeed, perhaps the villagers were also a bit perplexed as to your desire for an image, though they may be used to it. I like the context that you’ve shown in the image of not just the sign, which is funny in and of itself, but the fact that it welcomes you to a leafy green village adds to the enjoyment. I’ve also been in small villages where it would have been appropriate to place a sign with the actual “word we see” in your image at the entrance. I love language and its vagaries. Thank you!
@Apple_Glen_UK - I have a soft spot in my heart for Brighton though I’ve only been there once, way back on my 40th birthday. It’s a place to experience for sure and, well, of course they’d have an upside down house! I went and looked it up and it sounds like a fun experience to go inside as well. Your image captures the whimsy perfectly. I imagine it looks great at night lit up too. I love art and installations with an actual mind behind them - someone actually sat down and said “Hey, (puts down 5th empty pint glass) let’s put an upside-down house on the sea-front, it’ll be brilliant!”
@koolmagicguy - A classic “Dog Driver”! Over the years, I’ve encountered various incarnations of this in real life and always laugh. This was another “laugh-out-loud” image. I remember driving along side a large pick-up many years ago on their passenger side and a large dog was all I could see because of the angle of view and the size of the dog. Perhaps I am easily amused, but I thought it was very funny and indeed whimsical. It has always stuck with me so thank you for the memory.
@stillcrazyman - Whimsey by name and Whimsy by nature! It captures the topic very nicely. One of the things I love about our neighborhood here in Denver is that there’s no home-owner’s association and is full of the old and new homes side-by-side. There are older homes where the owners have gotten colorful, quirky and quite whimsical. There are interesting art installations in their yards and this image reminds me a lot of some of the (few) truly interesting homes I see on my walks. We need more color in our lives.
@OldMacs4Me - Oh Deer indeed! The caption fits in perfectly too as the animal seems as though he has had just that bit “too much”. We were staying in a vacation rental over the late summer in a town called Crestone here in Colorado and the deer were neck-deep. In our particular area there were a lot of apple trees so they just came into the yard to eat and were essentially tame and came right over to us. We have similar shots to this but not nearly as funny. Well captured!
@deep diver - Nice image and a quieter take on the theme - excellent! I find soap bubbles (or whatever ingredients) to be whimsical - they have an ephemeral nature and interact with their surroundings in interesting and unexpected ways. The interplay of shape and light, the swirls, patterns and composition are fun and invite the viewer to explore and bring in their imagination. For me I see a bit of Edvard Much and “The Scream” (but that’s just my own weird imagination). I also see a planet in space and (perhaps because I see the alligator image below yours too) a reptilian eyeball. This was a lot of fun and well crafted.
@MtLoin2020 - I love the perspective on the young alligator from above. I personally find alligators both interesting and very funny to look at, especially when they are walking on land. They essentially stopped evolving gazillions of years ago because they’re perfect at what they do - no need to change: "See it, eat it". The mothers are great parents and do their best to protect the young ones. They’re killing machines but they’re amusing too. Just be at a reasonable distance as you chuckle. That juxtaposition makes this an unexpected example of our theme.
@tizeye - A very nice interpretation of the theme. This is a great installation and perfect whimsy - who expects dinosaurs while on a walk in a nice manicured park/garden? It’s both in place - I think of dinosaurs with things like palm trees and ferns - and of course out of time. The colors are captured well and it reminds me that I do miss Spanish Moss and those very rich and diverse greens (I grew up in Savannah, GA), not something we have in the high dessert shadow of Denver.
@Darmok N Jalad - A perfect combination of ingredients for a nice bit of whimsy! A squirrel is a great subject for such themes because, well, they’re innately whimsical, I think. And the composition with the toy truck is gold. I have quite a trove of images from our yard that involve squirrels in poses with our various yard items, my favorite being one that we named “Peanut” enjoying a peanut butter sandwich that we made for her.
@Ish - I really like this image, including the composition, the black-and-white treatment and the take on this week’s theme. The composition itself pushes it nicely into my view of whimsy. It was planned and pleasing. The sign with the impending danger announced and then the “thing of impending danger”. I laughed out loud even though perhaps I shouldn’t have. Which I love. I remember a local national park that had a large wooden sign announcing a particular area was great for elk viewing. The wooden sign had nicely carved elk in a herd. And right by it was a herd of elk. Nature imitating art imitating nature.
@Laird Knox - I love this. It’s got a great 3-dimensionality and a quaint Americana that fits nicely into the theme and also stepping into the absurd. It has an edge to it with a sense of abandonment and desolation. I really like the arrangement of the elements, from the foreground to chair and sign, and also the distant mountains. “Nothing” indeed!
I want to thank everyone who participated. What great entries and now the really hard part. And I do mean hard. Everything was down to a gnat’s crochet. There was humor, quirkiness and some edginess too and I enjoyed getting to know a little bit about everyone’s minds. What follows is all down to personal taste on my part and of course the total subjectivity of the theme.
Second and third place will be slightly crowded podiums ("coward's way out").
The third place entries are "images of whimsical things". For me, third place part 1 goes to
@Apple_Glen_UK with a nicely executed image of a whimsical and quirky upside down house art installation in Brighton. It fits the theme well in a very direct way. Part 2 goes to
@tizeye with "Danger in Paradise". It's got quiet humor and great color.
The second place entries fit the theme for me in more complex ways, which I like and appreciate. They're also very different images. For one spot, I’m putting up
@Laird Knox. I love the composition and the image execution and how it is a slightly different tone to how I think of this theme. Great stuff. The second goes to
@deep diver - the more I looked at this image the more I loved it and the take on the theme. Whimsy by nature (to me anyway) works when there are subtleties and layers involved and that’s the case here. A very well executed image as well.
First place goes to
@Ish. I loved the composition (which includes the thought put into it) and the play on the theme. I don’t have a lot to say that I haven’t already said but…Congratulations and “Over to you!”.
. This week, I thought a bit of “playfully quaint or fanciful behavior or humor” (Whimsy) was called for. Quiet humor or quiet quirkiness, something that strikes your fancy.
I know you're there by Ray Harrison, on Flickr
Hastings by Ray Harrison, on Flickr
