Watery Grave
by Abra

Comment by FourPointX:
love the angle, the take, and the title. not too oversaturated and nice colors. 7

Watery Grave
by Abra

Comment by EL-ROI:
This is an interesting composition using the camera rotation to frame the shot. The harsher sunlight serves to shade the texture of the branch somewhat but it really highlighted the ripples in the water well. There seems to be an overall blue cast to the image.

Watery Grave
by Abra

Comment by KristinaG:
I think this shot would have been a lot more effective if the horizon wasn't so severely tilted. It is very disorienting.

Solar Power?
by Abra

Comment by amateurboi:
is this taken at India?

Solar Power?
by Abra

Comment by Luci11e:
like your concept here; the sun flare behind the light; nice lines in teh background

Mother Redback
by Abra

Comment by Yo_Spiff:
Cool spider. The only major problem with this is the blown highlights on the egg sacs. But I'm sure that I'm not the only "captain obvious" to point that out.

Little Gardener sees Garden Orb on Garden Shed
by Abra

Comment by Citadel:
Greetings from the Critique Club!

Congrats on entering your first of what I know will be many entries here at DP Challenge. Not a bad shot for your first entry and certainly better than what I entered.

Interesting scene laid out here and it definitely tells a story. The connection to the challenge isn't immediately apparent from the photo itself so the title had to be used to reinforce what you are going for. Generally (in my opinion anyways), if you need to use your title to tell the viewer why it fits the challenge they probably aren't going to be convinced anyways.

Challenge aside the shot does have potential. The boy's eyes take you straight across the frame to the spider on the left. The shed itself has interesting verticals.
I like the panaramic crop as it does work with the scene as you've presented it. The use of the border is ok here in my opinion. Borders are used to help contain the image so it stands out from the grey (in the case of DPC) background. Its a good thickness too and doesn't detract from the image.

Unfortunately the biggest issue with this image is the background. You have a very bright object in the background and an object in a very distracting blue tarp. Tough to frame a shot and keep an eye on all those things but in some cases your background is even more important than your subject or at least just as important. Remember, just because your aren't setting up all the elements doesn't mean you don't get to decide where they are when you look through the view finder. (i.e. move your feet!)

Not too shabby for your first time. Keep shooting and we all look forward to your next submission!

Little Gardener sees Garden Orb on Garden Shed
by Abra

Comment by Abra:
Thanks to everyone who commented. I completely agree with the criticisms made and would not have composed the photo in such a location if I had a choice. I am not particularly good at, or inspired by, taking photos in a staged setting. That̢۪s not to say I don̢۪t appreciate the skills and efforts achieved by those that do. I carry my old, beat-up cameral with me everywhere and try and capture moments that are special (to me at least) and not staged. I focusing on this spider hoping it would do something interesting while it was leaving its hiding hole to escape the hot tin shed. My three year old son, after proudly stealing my hat off me, came over to see what had my attention. He had inherited my wife̢۪s arachnophobia and I managed to quickly grab this photo just before (and accurately predicted by aliqui) he ran away.

I really liked this photo as it caught the moment of realisation of something scary in his garden. I also feel that the voting was fair for my photo (especially in comparison to some of the great photos submitted). Hopefully, one day I̢۪ll invest in some PP software and better equipment to improve my photo outcomes, but more importantly, learn from the comments made of my shots and the skills of those that I judge. My first challenge was more than a little fun.

Little Gardener sees Garden Orb on Garden Shed
by Abra

Comment by aliqui:
I can't say I'm terribly surprised this photo didn't do well here, but there's something about it that I love. The composition is oddly inspiring.

Keep submitting! Ta heck with voters.

Little Gardener sees Garden Orb on Garden Shed
by Abra

Comment by HarveyG:
Well spotted. If I may, I'd have gotten the child closer (if possible) to the green siding and made both he and the spider more prominent with less BG clutter.