"Back to earth"
by Thai

Comment by phreak:
no reflection would have been nice

"In Dirt you find the roots of life"
by Thai

Comment by tate:
It's sorta tough to find a good crisp focal point here.- amybe stepping back a bit would work.

"In Dirt you find the roots of life"
by Thai

Comment by violinist123:
Hmm, some problems here.

You've got something with a zero-thought-required relation to the challenge theme. This is good if you don't want to take any risks.

The subject matter is boring. Very boring. So the challenge for you is to present it in an interesting manner. Dead centered and slightly out of focus with nasty shadows and a pea soup background is not the approach to take.

Perhaps getting in closer, or cropping the image heavily, to present a section of the root ball with the dirt amidst the plant matter - in sharp focus - would work better. There are some interesting patterns in there. Shot from straight on or even slightly below would also work better than top down. Certainly a black (or white maybe) background would also set the subject off nicely and get it to stand out.

A final consideration is the lighting. Try setting this next to a window during the day and let the natural light fall on it from the side. That would accentuate the shadows within the root ball giving the whole thing much more depth and my eye much more to feast upon.

Hope those are some relatively helpful ideas. I imagine this photo is probably not setting a scoring record but maybe you are getting comments so you can make some improvements for the next challenge.

Good luck!

"In Dirt you find the roots of life"
by Thai

Comment by JRalston:
Out of focus. I think the DOF is just a bit to shallow to get the entire image in focus. The lighting is pretty harsh and appears to be from direct flash judging by the harsh shadows behind the plant.

"In Dirt you find the roots of life"
by Thai

Comment by DrAchoo:
A bit too zoomed in. I know what you are going for, but I just don't get enough context. Maybe it is the background that is getting me. It's quite an odd color. 4

"In Dirt you find the roots of life"
by Thai

Comment by JawnyRico:
Like the title, nice shot. Really like your idea here.

"In Dirt you find the roots of life"
by Thai

Comment by h2:
where's the focus?

"Back to earth"
by Thai

Comment by geneward2:
beautifully rendered image with the clarity and reflection

"Star"
by Thai

Comment by Qart:
A perfect image in every respect. 10

"Star"
by Thai

Comment by ursula:
Beautiful composition. Your score with this image will probably suffer because the background is not white, but a pinkish tone. ~7