Smokestackby
EstimatedEyesComment by eschelar: Interesting to read your comments about where you wanted this to go and then see where it went.
I see a couple of issues.
1 - crop - this affects a lot of things as this is a complex image.
Crop affects your horizon. Crop affects the position of the lock and its position in the viewing hierarchy. Crop affects the rhythm of the image, particularly when contrasting the close-up view of the wire-link fencing on the left and the pattern on the right.
2 - color - this affects the way we look at your message in the picture. The voters don't like much interpretation here, but I do. I personally would have tweaked the color a bit particularly in the sky to reduce the pure naturalness, possibly with some cues to the strongly colored signs. I might have experimented with a strong selective B&W with a yellow/orange or red filter to really get the sky fading to darkness to highlight the contrast with the smokestack too.
3 - subject management - you have a lot of subjects here. The lock, the smokestack, the fence and the signs. All of these play a role.
You were trying to relate the smokestack to the lock and chain, as well as build the impression of restriction from the signs as well as from the texture/opaqueness of the fence. From a composition POV, I would prefer to see the camera move in a couple of inches and up a bit. Perhaps just a hair to the right.
This would allow the lock and chain to 'frame' the smokestack using the asymmetrical V shape. You could have chosen to align the smokestack with the descending chain or with a part of the lock.
It is unfortunate that the scene seems so idyllic with no visible pollution coming from the smokestack as this really reduces it's visual role. Increasing contrast around the smokestack could take various forms.
Regarding the signs on the fence, it's not all bad. You seem to have a reasonable amount of use of 'vanishing point' to give depth to the signs, although it does feel that the right crop point needs to be moved in a bit to lessen their impact slightly.
If you want further demonstration of any of this, feel free to PM.
Photographer found comment helpful.
