Wood: Discussion(s) about the July 2025 contest

All the side discussions about the contest happen here.

My pick: photo 1 by Unamilanese – 3 points photo 2 by Unamilanese – 2 points photo 3 by Unamilanese – 1 point

Oops, did I post too soon?

Hi,

Yeah, a bit premature.

Besides, the only one likely to score points right now is jojoone.

Catherine

Oh, I *am* very touchy. But not as much as Herodotus! 😛

I don’t hang out on VF enough anymore to know everyone’s quirks...

Spruce, maple, mahogany, walnut, beech, rosewood:



Evenings in La Roque d'Anthéron.

Scene from life, wood sculpture

Hi,

In the wooden bas-relief series, the Doors of Santa Sabina, 5th century.

@Rouquine38, when I posted this topic, I wondered if you’d suggest a beaver dam 😜

Catherine

@Rouquine38, when I posted this topic, I wondered if you’d suggest a beaver dam 😛

Catherine

Nope, I do have beavers but no dam This topic isn’t easy for me, but I’ll definitely find some photos [;]

@Rouquine38, when I posted this topic I wondered if you were going to suggest a beaver dam 😛

Catherine

That goes way back—it was in 2022 that the beavers built their dam!

@dolma

Hello,

Because we're terribly bored on VF, which seems to be fast asleep, and I feel like I'm the only one awake around here

It's true the forum seems a bit lethargic, and even here it's very quiet. I thought the topic was easy, very open... Apparently not.

Uzbek wooden doors, with wool in Tashkent, ceramics in Samarkand, metal in Shahrisabz







Catherine

Scene from life, wood sculpture

Following this scene from life, here are those from the Gates of Paradise by Ghiberti at the Baptistery of Florence:

I’m continuing with the typical wooden *bacons* from the Canary Islands.

Firewood. Since time immemorial.

Other beach huts: In Cape Town, South Africa, they’re really colorful.

On Holbox Island in Mexico, the houses on the main street are almost all made of wood with gorgeous paintings.

Good evening,

Thanks for this beautiful collection. We’re traveling! 🙂

@Poste42, I really love the photos of woodpiles. No doubt because of childhood memories when I’d go there to gather wood for the fireplace, which we lit every day.



Catherine

It’s true that the forum seems a bit lethargic, and even here it’s very quiet. I thought the topic was easy, very open... Apparently not

No worries! There are silent lurkers ;) I find the topic pretty straightforward, but I need to be at my PC to post—it shouldn’t be long now…

Yes! Though I’m not sure we should wish you get your laptop back 😉

After the doors, some columns:



(Juma Mosque in Khiva)

And some capitals:



(mosque in the Bukhara citadel)

Catherine

porte du Paradis de Ghiberti du Baptistère de Florence

Made of wood?! 😉

Gates of Paradise

Material: bronze

Entirely gilded bronze... 😮

Ghiberti’s Gates of Paradise at Florence Baptistery

Made of wood?! 😉

Gates of Paradise

Material: bronze

Entirely gilded bronze... 😮

Oops! You’re right—I thought it was wood, but that was just my impression from the lifelike scenes. I didn’t double-check 😅 Glad someone’s paying attention 😄 Thanks, Raga! 🤗

Hi,

This one is really made of wood—cypress, to be exact:





Catherine

Wood as decor—here’s an elephant made from Central African wood.

In northern Sweden: coming soon to your IKEA.



My palace for a stuga!

By the shores of Lake Malawi



To improvise, we make do with whatever’s available.

Hi there!

How’s the contest going? 😉 They’re gorgeous and totally belonged in it.

Oil on wood from the 16th century:



Sculpture from the 21st century:



Catherine

And to complement Lili's second photo, the instruments of a Saint Cecilia and the angel:



Cat

Ephemeral driftwood construction on Sérignan beach. You’ll notice that some spots can still be peaceful, even in July, even around 11 AM! You just have to walk a bit and accept that the beach isn’t lifeguarded or “cleaned”—it’s just pieces of wood after all.

More photos taken in the Cévennes

Furniture making in wood is still done artisanally in Vietnam.

Hello

In China, the gesture is similar, even though here it's wood—already shaped into a pie-roller—that’s used.

Wood as a building material for outdoor or indoor use

in Indonesia, on the island of Nias off the coast of Sumatra





in India, in Gujarat or Rajasthan

Russian church, Slovenia



Summer mountain village, Slovenia



Picnic at the mountain hut, Slovenia



How about some roast pork on the grill? Meet-up in Croatia every weekend....

Italian politicians?

I sure hope the random guy in the background was reported for this crime by the surveillance video 😉😄

Hi Agnès

Just a little nod to your Photo No. 3



A tiny robin (in the center, above a blue "circle") was still living not long ago at the top of a tall beech tree, but the forest management team came and brought it back to economic reality and down to ground level.

Good evening everyone,

Thanks for these beautiful and very diverse photos! 🙂 The option to post photos expires tomorrow evening. Then it’s time to vote.

Catherine

Hello

Photo No. 2

In a quiet neighborhood—and there are more of them than you might imagine—in Tokyo (possibly around Harajuku, but no guarantees), a tea salon hides behind a wooden structure.



Not far away, Minami-Aoyama. SunnyHills, a Taiwanese pastry shop: https://www.sunnyhills.com.tw/store/ja-jp/

Architect: Kengo Kuma, designer, among other things, of several pavilions for the 2025 World Expo, including Portugal’s.

More than just a photographic achievement, it’s above all a slice of life that directly inspired this month’s theme for me. On July 2, 2019, after a hellish night listening to the forest creaking around us, we woke up to over 160 hectares and 40,000 cubic meters of wood torn up like matchsticks by the storm that raged all night. But the elders knew where to build their houses, and miraculously, none were damaged.

Thanks, Maître, for these valuable additional details 😉

Wooden walls in Japan:

I didn’t quite get when the voting starts?

In the meantime, here’s the link to the slideshow.

(The photos from 4ecofuel as published are tricky to insert properly into the slideshow...)

Good evening,

Just a little reminder for those who remember:

My Photo No. 2



was part of a photo album titled:

Small or narrow houses/buildings in Tokyo/Yokohama

https://goo.gl/photos/DrrahSXGTn2MFs4HA

Of course we all remember. Just like we haven’t forgotten our "friend" Kujila 🤪

It doesn’t make the choice any easier—I’m approaching this from a "travel inspiration" perspective

Hi Catherine,

Since these contests started up again, I’ve felt like we’ve moved away from that idea. I see some lovely photos, but not always ones that feel like "travel inspiration." Given the low participation, we’ll probably need to keep going in this direction, but it’d be helpful to clarify it in the rules. For example: 2 out of 3 photos should be travel photos.

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"Travel photography is different from other subcategories of photography. It’s a genre with few limits on how its images can be defined, but it puts photographers to the test due to the sheer number of challenges they face. In travel photography, you can expect to see a wide range of images capturing any combination of landscapes, portraits, street scenes, culture, food, underwater shots, and more. However, the unique element at the heart of travel photography is that these images—spanning all those subcategories—are meant to capture and share moments in time from different cultures, alternative ways of life, and diverse geographic locations around the world." https://pix-populi.fr/la-photographie-de-voyage-expliquee/