Castle on the Hill
by KarenNfld

Comment:
What's black and white and RED all over? ;) gratz!

Picture 135 apple tarte.jpg
by pawdrix

Comment:
nice choice in surrounding objects. their colors and shapes lend well (specifically BG objects). That looks seriously tasty!

See It To Believe It--16 Months After Hurricane Katrina
by Gallatin

Comment:
quite an interesting pic. I wonder how related the smashed up car is.

It's interesting that the CBS probably put more money into that billboard from tip to tail than it would have cost to take care of that building... not that that means anything at all...

Nice juxtaposition in the pic.

Self Portrait
by posthumous

Comment:
lighting is flat and I hate the border... Oh, and the '80s called. they want their glasses back! ;)

Smokestack
by EstimatedEyes

Comment:
Interesting to read your comments about where you wanted this to go and then see where it went.

I see a couple of issues.

1 - crop - this affects a lot of things as this is a complex image.

Crop affects your horizon. Crop affects the position of the lock and its position in the viewing hierarchy. Crop affects the rhythm of the image, particularly when contrasting the close-up view of the wire-link fencing on the left and the pattern on the right.

2 - color - this affects the way we look at your message in the picture. The voters don't like much interpretation here, but I do. I personally would have tweaked the color a bit particularly in the sky to reduce the pure naturalness, possibly with some cues to the strongly colored signs. I might have experimented with a strong selective B&W with a yellow/orange or red filter to really get the sky fading to darkness to highlight the contrast with the smokestack too.

3 - subject management - you have a lot of subjects here. The lock, the smokestack, the fence and the signs. All of these play a role.

You were trying to relate the smokestack to the lock and chain, as well as build the impression of restriction from the signs as well as from the texture/opaqueness of the fence. From a composition POV, I would prefer to see the camera move in a couple of inches and up a bit. Perhaps just a hair to the right.

This would allow the lock and chain to 'frame' the smokestack using the asymmetrical V shape. You could have chosen to align the smokestack with the descending chain or with a part of the lock.

It is unfortunate that the scene seems so idyllic with no visible pollution coming from the smokestack as this really reduces it's visual role. Increasing contrast around the smokestack could take various forms.

Regarding the signs on the fence, it's not all bad. You seem to have a reasonable amount of use of 'vanishing point' to give depth to the signs, although it does feel that the right crop point needs to be moved in a bit to lessen their impact slightly.

If you want further demonstration of any of this, feel free to PM.

High Speed Pass
by HikerDude

Comment:
brilliant timing!

Dinner Party - SP7
by alfresco

Comment:
aka - what to do with all this extra meat? :)

mannequin
by lovethelight

Comment:
did you liquify her eyes? wow!

...forthwith there came out blood and water.
by mpeters

Comment:
fantastic shot. No idea how you did that nail so convincingly. It really looks like it has pierced the foot.

The Cowboy
by JawnyRico

Comment:
looks good man, gratz on the first blue!