Snack Time
by Gracious

Comment by kaush:
I think if you had put the popcorn in a bowl, put some butter on them and taken a close up of the popcorn - it would have created a better texture effect.

Snack Time
by Gracious

Comment by jonpink:
lovely pure red bg, would crop an inch from left though so the box fills the frame.

Snack Time
by Gracious

Comment by justine:
Nice compositon, colors and light.

Snack Time
by Gracious

Comment by drydoc:
Unfortunately you ate most of it! I feel (personal taste. . . no pun intended) that it would have bee more dramatic if there had been a volume of pop corn pouring out of the box filling the frame with more texture.

Snack Time
by Gracious

Comment by jpochard:
Simple idea, well shot I think. Good texture and focus. Good colors and lighting.

Both Wave on Command...All the Time!
by Gracious

Comment by tolovemoon:
too cute

Swamp Dragon
by Gracious

Comment by kaycee:
Greetings from the Critique Club! You've chosen an interesting subject, but one that is hard to capture well. Living creatures, particularly those whose domain is air or water, are really difficult to find in a good 'pose'. This one is typical - as others commented, it would have been better had his head been turned more your direction. That being said, it seems to me you did very well to capture him. Things I don't like about this photo are things that are really not possible to change. The water is not clean-looking, trash and debris (is that a grapefruit half in the background?) in the water, reeds are blurred or over-sharpened. It might very well benefit from a closer cropping - more of a panorama look that would include only the reflection of the reeds thus getting rid of the 'trash' in the water. To be honest, after looking at your portfolio, I don't really feel qualified to be delivering a critique of your work - you have so many lovely photos! And, being a fellow Floridian, I know how difficult it is to catch these guys where everything is perfect. I think you did a pretty good job with this guy, all things considered!

Pollen on the Move
by Gracious

Comment by Harz_Joerg:
Greetings from the Critique Club

Initial thoughts/My opinion
Colourful image speaking of flowing shape, lines and a strong blue. Initially I didn't get the title.

Content/Composition
A very tranquilling, aesthetic picture that is very well composed: having the grass on the lower right with showing some of their reflections is well considered. Beside this main-focal-point the wonderfully flowing lines of the water with its smooth surface work very well. And the contrast between the blue and green is very good too.
So regarding the composition everything is just right.

Camera work -technically
Focus, exposure and white balance are all set right as far as I can see.

Digital Processing - Technical
It seems that we look at a small crop out of the original that is oversharpened: the water is somewhat grainy. The colour saturation is also a bit too strong for my taste.

Fits the challenge
I do see an issue here: even with the title I can not see it too well in NG. While the topic "pollen" is of course well suited for NG, I and probably other don't see this topic in the image. This is of course do to my lack of detailed knowledge about pollen.

Good luck for your upcoming submissions

Swamp Dragon
by Gracious

Comment by train:
Wow what a beast! Its a shame the background is so busy the detail on the animal is good I always find it hard to take a good image near and on water so many reflections Good image though

Swamp Dragon
by Gracious

Comment by TooCool:
The angle that the gator (croc?) is facing makes the shot seem much less interesting. If she was facing toward the camera or at least had majority of head above water it would be nicer in a compositional sense. Also the grasses in the background appear to be over sharpened...
TC