Angkor Wat

Angkor Wat. A symbol of Cambodia, the world’s largest religious building and a pinnacle in the temple complex of Angkor. Close to 1 million people used to live in Ankor at a time when London was home to just 35,000 people. It is the finest expression of art and architecture I have seen. If one had a working time machine, the construction and the daily life of Angkor back in it’s heyday would be one of my must-see things.

My guide Nathan Horton and I of course captured the traditional sunrise silhouette but I shall present you with a view from the Northwest side, featuring one of our good monk friends, Thun. Angkor Wat is enormous, the outer wall is 1 kilometer long, and not an easy structure to fit in a photo, much less with the many tourists crowding many a photo opportunity. We got in very early and moved fast to stay ahead of the crowds and had our beautiful monk friends as models adding human interest and story in every frame. Here we have Thun wandering the walls of the Northwest corner.

cambodia-angkor

This image is a single frame, the composition is aimed at a big print and not a screen, and I am still working on finding the best processing and crop. Still, I wished to share with you a work-in-progress version, offering you a glimpse of the stunning Angkor Wat. I spend three days here and that was just an intro, I could return and capture images for 3 months at this beautiful place. Nathan Horton is printing some of our images and bringing them back to the monks and I am excited to hear the outcome. I also found our good monks friends so interesting and exciting I started to ponder how I would look in an orange robe with a shaved head. Different to say the least. Perhaps this is one idea that should very much just stay an idea.

Flemming

12 Comments on “Angkor Wat”

    1. Thank you Radek. Compositions like these are made for big prints, they don't really work that well at tiny screen size. I think you're right on the square crop, I think I cropped this 10 times last night and this is what I ended up with so far 🙂

      1. hahah, maybe one day you will wake up and he will have moved!

        good to meet you last night! hopefully catch up with you and some of the gang for a shoot soon!

    1. Thanks mate! I just checked and he hasn't moved yet, so I need to bring a bit more Jedi power it seems. (my jedi powers knows no bounds, like last night when I send a mind trick to Christian saying 'you will now knock over a champagne glass!")

  1. Now this is an impressive altered landscape! I reckon the monk looks good where he is. Maybe the silly rule of thirds shouldn't apply for square pics. Bang in the centre often looks best. Great use of colour.

    Cheers

    Dave

    1. Thanks Dave ! I agree on the so called "rule", I do not care much, if it works it works and every image has it's own crop and composition, no rules in art. It is still a good guideline for beginners though. My monk friend would however balance the towers a tiny bit more if he moonwalked backwards a few steps 🙂 Thanks mate.

  2. Would have loved to have seen the place with you, Flem.

    One suggestion: It may very well be my screen settings that suck, but it seems to me that there's something missing regarding either contrast or saturation? Ah well, work in progress you wrote…

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