Waitingby
ArtanComment: *** CRITIQUE CLUB COMMENT ***
This is a generally appealing image that does not really have any areas I can dive into for constructive criticism except 2 things that occur to me:
1. It seems a little oversaturated to me. The sky's so blue, the hat's so red, the dayglo jacket's so dayglo. The overall effect is so cartoonish that it's hard to take an emotional sense from this. In your comments you mention it was "bloomning cols with a bracing wind." I get no sense of either from the photo.
2. On the nit level, it's unfortunate that the seated figure on the right is sprouting the lamppost from his head. That figure is a key element in the composition; without him it's much more static. I find it intriguing that one of your ammenters says that figure is a liability; IMO, the complete opposite is true.
Speaking of the image specifically from the POV of the challenge it was entered in, I think it may have suffered from not having what I would consider a "true" candid feel. For me, a "true" candid carries some sort of an emotional overtone, and this is lacking in that aspect. There's no tension, no faces to speak of, no emotion at all.
In a more general sense, the composition, while pleasant enough, is entirely static. It's not "bad" composition (It has good diagonals, good intersections, a prominent foreground object, etc) but it's not really "going" anywhere exciting.
Altogether, a competent but unremarkable image, nothing to get excited about but nothing to discard in despair either.
Keep on shooting!
Robt.
Photographer found comment helpful.
