Critique #52 *Open Theme* 5 Participants

[raid]

Jon: Your photo breaks a few rules, but rules are there to be challnged and once in a while break them! The person in the front is less sharp than the person in the back. There seems to be a chair getting into the picture in the right lower corner. Still, the look on the teenager's face is fascinating. Good catch!



Nico: This is a good one. It sems to have been taken on a ship/ferry. The man'sface tells stories while his wife just looks at you. The right side gives us a sneak view on the surrounding environment ... here a ship?


Warren: You have captured a wonderful moment of closeness between these two people. I wonder how much better the image might have been if taken slightly from the front instead?



Dave: This is a good catch. Maybe, and just maybe, if the panning had been better used and if done with the girl slightly more to the left, this image would be even stronger. Well done.

Raid

 

[Warren T.]

Raid - Vintage Beach Scene: This is an interesting scene with a couple of very cute kids. I like the contrasting expressions on the two girls. The vignetting, grain, and tone do give the impression of a vintage picture.

The bright areas of the image, unfortunately, draw my attention to the space just above the girls right around the person standing behind them and to the buildings in the background. I was also going to suggest cropping a little closer, perhaps eliminating some of the side space, but that would just accentuate the background behind the girls, so I would just leave it as is.

Jon Claremont - Late Night Cafe: This is another interesting shot. The girl looks a bit apprehensive, maybe even a little frightened. The smooth bokeh of the lens actually helps this shot because it allows the eye to smoothly focus away from the man in the foreground to the girl. The disinterested expression of the man serves to accentuate the isolation of the girl.

Perhaps cropping just little more from the right side would eliminate the distracting object in the right foreground, and some of the extraneous details in the right background. I would crop it at the middle of the chair on the right.

Nico - Fish Fear Me: Yet another nice candid with great contrasting expressions between the two people. The man's fierce expression reflects the title well. The composition is good because you included the information on the right which showed that this couple was on a ferry or boat.

I don't have any suggestions on this one.

Ausdlk - Dave's Pic: This is a great composition, well captured. Great job! I like how the skateboarder is between the two shadows on the wall. The shadow on the left repeats the pose of the boarder, but the tree shadow in the background joins with that shadow to produce an interesting shape to ponder. The sun spot highlights the subject perfectly, and the rising horizontal lines give a sense of motion and pleasing linearity.

Again, no suggestions for this one.

Folks, thanks for the opportunity to comment on these great shots!

--Warren

 

[nico]

sorry for being late with my critiques, but i've been a little busy...went shooting saturday, sunday and today .... ( 🙂 feel free to envy me!).

Raid:
another great family shot, and a nice capture; your young models make the shot, Lina (if i remember correctly) with a contagious smile and Dana (very funny) with a "diva" pose. As constructive criticism - maybe - i'd rather have a more oof background. 🙂

Jon,
I remember I left a positive comment on this one in one of my first posts in w/nw thread. I can only confirm that I like it: the selective focus (oof foreground ) drives my eye to the girl whose expression is sad/worried. furthermore the pose of the man in the foreground (he looks like being thinking) adds a loneliness feeling to the shot; as i wrote in my old comment the scene has a "hopperish" mood that i like so i wouldn't change anything. 🙂

Warren
A peaceful and quiet romantic shot. i like the soft tones and light. the oof background and the square format works well here avoiding any kind of distraction. I would not change anything here. 🙂

Dave
a good street shot, i like composition and light/shadow pattern on the wall. I also like the sense of motion from the skateborader pose. well seen and excuted so no suggestions here. 🙂

Bye
nico

 

[Warren T.]

This thread is dying a painfully, agonizingly slow death. :bang: 🙁 :bang:

I think you know what I mean 🙂

--Warren

 

[AusDLK]

Raid: A very interesting image. My first thought was that it had a distinctively "Chernobyl-like" quality. I cannot help but wonder how this particular image affect was achieved -- but actually it doesn't matter. As is, the image is strong and evocative but more importantly mysterious. Compositionally I wish that there was something in the left third of the frame to provide some balance but this is only a minor nitpick. A whole series of similar images could be quite impressive.

Jon: I like the middle third of this one. The girl's expression, one approaching fear, is compelling. Unfortunately the man's completely casual composure steals some of that energy from the image for me. And the background, bright and cluttered as it is, pulls my eye away from what I think is the focal point of the image -- the girl's anxiety -- and adds little to the emotion captured there. Something might be achieved with some tight cropping but I know that many photographers accept their images only full frame and sharpness may suffer as well. As is, you have 1/3 of a compelling photograph IMHO.

Nico: What is going on in this one? The woman maybe has seen the photographer and the old man is pissed about something... Lots of humanity going on the left of the image. Then there's whatever is in the nicely out of focus background -- my first thought was a laundromat (not that it really matters). I'm just not sure if the two halves completely work together. They compete for my eye (like watching a tennis match) rather than complementing each other. Technically it is a beautifully realized black & white image but something about the balance within the image doesn't agree with me.

Warren: I am struggling with this one. It lacks sharpness that I think keeps it from being technically good black & white image. I do love the grain and the out of focus background. I suppose that if I knew these people I might appreciate the image itself a little more but since I don't, I have a hard appreciating it as anything more than a slightly blurry snapshot. Specifically, I would ask the photographer what is he trying to convey here? What about it is supposed to engage the viewer -- does anything? I mean it is a sweet moment but there is not anything compelling about it to make it an interesting photograph to a casual observer.

 

[raid]

Thanks to everyone for this discussion and critique. My image was [of course] of my daughters. It is an ongoing challenge for me to keep my children photos interesting [to me] by experimenting with different film and playing with PS to get a certain effect since I don't do my own film developing.

Raid



P.S. Dave: I used EFKE25 film and had the film developed commercially by a local lab. Their developing caused the "Chernobyl Effect". I actually thought this way when I got back several rolls of EFKE25. I had to smile when I read your comment.


======================
Raid: A very interesting image. My first thought was that it had a distinctively "Chernobyl-like" quality. I cannot help but wonder how this particular image affect was achieved -- but actually it doesn't matter. As is, the image is strong and evocative but more importantly mysterious. Compositionally I wish that there was something in the left third of the frame to provide some balance but this is only a minor nitpick. A whole series of similar images could be quite impressive.
==========================