A Quiet Seaside Town
by Konador

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club

Hi Ben;
Now it's up to me to give you a critique!

Hmmm..., let's see what we have here....

Initial thoughts/My opinion
Wonderful scenery living from the high contrast between the deep black and the bright lights. The leading line coming from the quay could have be pronounced more.

Content/Composition
The image gives a feeling of being at a nice small town at a calm, still cold night. One likes to look at the scenery but also likes to go inside the friendly houses along the seaside. This is probably due to the choice of B&W with a relatively high contrast: it looks as if there are just three values of brightness: pure black, the medium grey of the sea and houses and then pure white of the lights. I like that.
The viewers eyes always follow the leading line of the quay and I would have preferred it if it would stretch more diagonal along the image, i.e. if your position would be more to the right. This would have probably also lead to a less large dark area at the lower left and at the right side. These areas are a little large IMO.
A tighter crop would have result almost in the same effect.

Camera work -technically
Looks very good to me: focus seems right, although I don't want to call the image crisp.
Exposure time seems to be relatively short, judged from the not completely smooth sea surface. That was a good choice: made the water more interesting.
Exposure is well set for the achieved effect. Does the graininess come from selecting a high ISO-value?

Digital Processing - Technical
Looks a little over sharpened, might this be another reason for the graininess? I do like the frame.

Fits the challenge
Of course it does: very after dark!

Good luck for your upcoming submissions

Cardinal Bracing Against The Snow Storm
by Drake

Comment:
That's areal beauty! Like the colour, crispness and the snowflaks on the bird as well as on the background. I can feel the coldness! Good luck to you.

Prehistoric Sea Animals from the Ordovician Sea
by Marjo

Comment:
Nice use of DOF in this colourfull image. It's a little bright though and also too grainy. Otherwise well composed and captured.

Nemo: The Truth About Clown Fish
by KING

Comment:
I like the light and the colour very much. Only the balance between the fishs and the rocks is a little off. Maybe only showing just one fish would have been better.
Still, I hope you do well with this wonderfull image.

Surveying the scene
by dan_pendleton

Comment:
Even without the current cahllenge subject everybody would associate this image with NG! Great pose of the kitty and very crisp. One of my favorits. Good luck.

Weighing In the Future
by librodo

Comment:
Great image: love the composition and colour. Also well cropped.
One of my very favorits. Good luck to you!

MENACING
by ellamay

Comment:
Also congratulations from me! Awesome building presented wonderfully.

Desert Moonlight
by dsidwell

Comment:
Congrats to this stuning shot, showing the beauty of nature at its best!

Ready...Aim...Fire
by Shannon

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club

Initial thoughts/My opinion
Oh, what happened here: looks like an enlarged thumbnail. Lot of action, but to be honest: I don't like guns.

Content/Composition
I don't want to address my disliking of guns here, because that completely my personal taste.
You captured of course a moment of great action: there is almost nothing having more action in the sense of speed, sound etc. than a firing gun. Also that you captured the gunfire and the smoke is very well done: how many shots did it take to get it right?
The way you presented the scenery is well made too: the way you cropped it is well thought out and the balance between the sky and ground is good. Also having the gun horizontally is good.

Camera work -technically
Exposure seems OK although the man's shirt is a little bright, but it adds to the mood of the image. Regarding the focus I can not say much due to the extremely low quality.

Digital Processing - Technical
Of course I have not seen the original, you probably needed to crop out a small section out of it. However, the image is simply dominated by digital artefacts coming from need image and maybe from the jpeg compression. A smaller size might have been better here or a strong artistic filter might have helped to overcome the technical shortcomings.
BTW: I really would love to see the original to see if there couldn't be another approach to increase its quality.

Fits the challenge
Of course it fits very well.

Personal Remark
That it did so bad could have honestly be foreseen: DPC-voters, especially in member-challenges are very much looking for the image quality and vote everything down that comes short here, no matter what subject is shown. I had this experience too with my Cliché entry.
By this I learned that if an image is below a certain standard, it's better not to submit at all.


Good luck for your further submissions

Father-Daughter Sledding
by Emeraulde

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club

Initial thoughts/My opinion
Great scenery, very well captured and presented. Action needs to be made up in my mind including the title and thinking about how father and daughter are sledding town the hill.

Content/Composition
Not much to say other then wonderful: the huge trees build a awesome frame (therefore not adding a boarder was wise), the road is a wonderful leading line and the high position of the camera strengthen the "uphill-impression": father and daughter a really going upwards. Also their small size relative to the rest of the image fit very well.
B&W was good choice too.
Thumb up for all that!

Camera work -technically
Also not much to say other than very well made: exposure is great, especially considering that snow images are always hard to take. Focus and wide DOF are well set also.

Digital Processing - Technical
Cropping, sharpening etc. are great, no flaws I can see.

Fits the challenge
That's probably the point where many voters had problems with: it does not show the action itself, rather the upcoming action in the near future. So the viewer has to make the action by him-/her-self. For me that was not too much of a problem, but envision someone from Australia, Indonesia or just Southern California or Florida who never did a sledge ride with some kids: for those the action can not be foreseen.
Anyhow, it's a great picture and I would have submitted it too, even knowing it might come short in "fitting the challenge", just for its beauty.

Good luck for your further submissions