Motion Clouds,
by arash1987

Comment:
These clouds look naturally blurred (exposure) to me and it makes for a striking composition. Very well balanced shot and nice use of the foreground subject.

Corn on the Cob
by Cam

Comment:
Tasty looking feet! Excellent texture - you did well to get so close. They look so reptilian when you don't see the owner, very reminiscent of dinosaurs. Good take.

Four Feet Up
by Konador

Comment:
I took some shots like this (I'll upload some after) but this is very good with some lovely lighting and tone around the feet.

My one bug is the people's stance. I'd much rather they were not looking down and we were left with just the shapes. The arrangement of the feet is also a little awkward and an off-centre composition would assist the light, airy feel in the shot.

"Poverty is a veil that obscures the face of greatness"
by Loki

Comment:
This is doubtless an excellent photo - rich in tonal range and texture, full of detail and well composed. The only flaw in my view, is that these feet are bereft of the very context that led them to be this way.

For the cynics this is a staged shot reliant on the title to suggest it's a genuine subject - and the trainers/sneakers appear to be pretty decent apart from some carefully placed, crisply cut holes.

For those who aren't cynical and go for DPC aesthetic, it's a blue ribbon.

For me - I'm between the two. It's not perfect because of the lack of context which would add so much gravitas - of course it might still not satisfy cynics, but there would be more of a statement for its case.

New Skin
by connie

Comment:
Great capture and concept.

Have a Break, Have a Kit Kat
by jimika

Comment:
Now why change a good catchline? It's now 'Make the Most of Your Break.' If it ain't broke don't fix it in my view.

This shot could have been much improved with two main changes:
1) Off-centre the main subject - the tip of the KitKat (perhaps showing a length of the stick receding)
2) Get in closer with less background - and retain perfect focus. If focal range is too short, pull out and crop the rest away. There's some nice texture and that there KitKat and it's a shame not see it more clearly.

Lord Of The Wasp's
by ConcreteDonkey

Comment:
:: Hello from the Critique Club ::
............................................................

This is a super-smooth detail of a creature I both admire and loathe. The flat lighting adds a surreal quality and the background is sufficiently blurred so as not to distract. The ground texture is good, but overall the only criticism is the narrow DOF which is possibly something out of your control.

Ideally, if the wasp was quite static you could stop down to something like f6-8 and use a slower shutter speed to gain more depth.

It's a good shot regardless of this and deserved its high placing.

Cratered Moon in the Milky Way
by jdavis

Comment:
:: Hello from the Critique Club ::
............................................................

Firstly, this is a very cute concept, very striking and well designed compositionally. It's well shot, crisp and clear.

As it stands your blueberry looks more like Earth, so you could have titled it 'Cratered Earth in the Milky Way'. I did in fact see what this looked like inversed (hope you don't mind) and it did look spookily like the moon! It may have been an idea to try this and use Hue/Sat to give it the blue hue. Normally, in challenges this kind of treatment would be voted down but given the theme it may have survived in tact.

All the best for future challenges - I'm sure you'll do well.

'Puddle'
by suemack

Comment:
Good capture - nice comp. Colour is a bit drab, so i'd experiment with colour balance to see what you could do to draw people's attention away from the absolute basic colour-from-camera look. Try using Channel Mixer in greyscale mode then adjusting the opacity to see how it affects it. It may look a bit more gritty and meaningful.

Free to Bee
by pogboy4

Comment:
:: Hello from the Critique Club ::
............................................................

This is without doubt a timely, difficult capture. You did well to be there and to frame it. All that's missing is fast shutter speed, as you actually have focused on the bee very well indeed - it's just moveing too fast for your conditions.

Ideally you should set your camera to shutter priority mode and gauge light conditions by observing your camera's histogram and aperture readings. Too fast and you'll get a dark, noisy shot; too slow and you'll get blurred motion.

Experiment on the flower prior to the bee's arrival to see which results work best. You could also try setting it to Image Burst mode here (I don't know the Rebel but I imagine it has some sophisticated settings) which will give you more shots to choose from. Finally, try to use a tripod and select your best flower, then wait! You should get lucky.

OIne final note - a bit more of the flower and less dark space at the top would have improved the composition.

Cheers
Jon