the same but completely different

Apparenly we are 99.9% identical to a mongoose DNA profile wise.

Something like that anyway.  But clearly we are totally different.  I mean, besides its penchant for attacking highly venomous snakes the mongoose is way smarter than any human, but you get my drift.

Last year when I stayed in Kent with my sister, I tried to cajole Corinne into getting more creative with her camera and set her some simple challenges.  (It hasn't worked by the way - she rarely shoots seriously which is a shame).

Corinne's image

Anyway, I set her a task of collecting a selection of garden detritus.  You know, the sort of stuff that ends up in the compost bin.  And when she was done, I got her to just empty the bag of bits onto the ground and then not touch them so they retained their random pattern before photographing them.

Corinne got a fantastic image.  One of her best ever, which we later printed and framed.  It was that good.

Mine, while being 99.9% the same is nowhere near as effective.  While Corinne photographed hers from directly above, on a tripod and with a lovely Nikon D300, I took mine on my phone standing next to her.  But most importantly, I tried re-arranging mine slightly - losing the original's, erm, originality.  It's incredible how different the images are.

Here's mine:

 

It's hard to put my finger on why one is better than the other.  But I think it's the overall tonality and look of Corinne's image that wins out over mine.

Of course, it was my idea really and my expert tuition that saw things pan out that way.  And it's not a competition.  Not that I'm sore or anything...