This image has been rejected by me during the selection process for contest participation.
Let me tell you how and why this happened...
...happens...
It's a new, Dark edition of an aerial shot from my landing on Tenerife island. Even before I went there, I was fascinated by the terrain and its diversity, albeit in desert tones.
Camera Settings:
Aperture F 8; Shutter Speed 1/800 sec.; Light Sensitivity ISO 200; Focal Length 50 mm.
Shot from a landing airplane.
The selection included three more shots from Tenerife, all of them — Dark edition.
Mount Teide
Camera Settings:
Aperture F 8; Shutter Speed 1/640 sec.; Light Sensitivity ISO 100; Focal Length 135 mm.
The same peak from afar. Visible as a small and not very steep cone in the background.
Camera Settings:
Aperture F 10; Shutter Speed 1/400 sec.; Light Sensitivity ISO 100; Focal Length 16 mm.
The West Coast facing the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.
And the same frame but in color.
Camera Settings:
Aperture F 8; Shutter Speed 1/50 sec.; Light Sensitivity ISO 200; Focal Length 50 mm.
Then I included some variety represented by a bridge over a misty river...
Camera Settings:
Aperture F 4; Shutter Speed 1/500 sec.; Light Sensitivity ISO 400; Focal Length 104 mm.
...
A shot of the Solar Eclipse from 2010.
Camera Settings:
Aperture F 16; Shutter Speed 1/1000 sec.; Light Sensitivity ISO 800; Focal Length 255 mm.
...
An abstract-looking shot of a huge murder of crows in flight. At dusk.
Camera Settings:
Aperture F 11; Shutter Speed 1/2 sec.; Light Sensitivity ISO 400; Focal Length 16 mm.
...
A combination of the two above that did not turn out very productive...
A close up in contre jour of heavy snowfall.
And its negative image.
... etc.
The topic was Ten Years of Darkness — a competition by the 
But then again, 
The Dustbowl is a natural phenomenon caused by erosion, winds, other favorable (for it) conditions and it's pretty nasty. Meaning, it can turn the sky in a basket (or a bowl) of constantly raging dust storms, and the land in a...well, wasteland.
And it happened in our history about 80 years ago and the problem persisted for another 10 years. But more of that you will find in the author's story.
I was the illustrator and when I realized I could actually paint something very similar to the image that was initially planned, I scrapped the photos above and I did it. I already posted about it Here.
That painting took me a while but not as long as the selection and editing of the photographs above did.
So was that time wasted?
This is the point of this post. To tell you that I am happy I went through the lot and I was able to see them from a new perspective. Once I did so, I had a new collection of images to use for some other purpose.
I rejected them but once but maybe some other time, one of them will become the runner for another contest or project.
One man's trash is another man's treasure.
Right? I am both men, depending on the circumstances.
Thank you for viewing and reading this article!
Yours,
Manol