Diana Robinson was on Broadway at 14th Street in New York City last November photographing the Veterans Day parade when something other than parade photos came to mind. “I’d attended Rich Clarkson’s Fall Photography at the Summit workshop in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, the previous month,” Diana says, “and Jay Maisel had given this wonderful presentation titled Perception. He talked about shooting diagonals, and one of the things he said was, ‘Ambiguous images demand more thought,’ so you should try to create something that’s going to demand a little bit more from the viewer. So the idea of holding the camera on a diagonal and looking up came from him.”

Creating an image that’s deliberately ambiguous often calls for the photographer to do a little more in the way of observing and selecting. “If you want to take pictures that get ‘What the heck is going on here?’ reactions, you have to think a little more yourself,” Diana says, “and I liked the idea of shooting an image where you can’t really tell right away what’s going on other than interesting forms and reflected colors.”

She made the photo with a D3S and an AF-S NIKKOR 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR. The exposure was 1/2500 second at f/8 and ISO 3200, with the camera set for aperture priority and Matrix metering.

Not only did the idea for the photo come from Jay Maisel, so did the lens. “He was talking about how he had a good walk-around lens now—the 28-300mm NIKKOR—so of course I bought one as soon as I got back to New York and started walking around with it, and sure enough, it was great.

“But I did break one of his rules,” she adds. “He said color is very seductive and you shouldn’t really mix color and form. But I think it works in this case.”

Works for us, too.