Amazing!
by eschelar

Comment:
Oh, I'm completely in agreement with you about the power of books, and the ability of literature to amaze and and delight. But for a photo in a popular challenge, I think the source of the amazement needs to be more apparent. For the DPC crowd in particular, you need to hit people over the head to make your point. Knowing your view of literature and your profession, your pic communicates that idea beautifully. Just seeing the photo and the title without that context, I'd have liked to see it score higher, but can understand (at least partially) why it didnt.

Originally posted by eschelar: :)Strangeghost: There is a noble hope in this picture that others will have found books as fascinating as I have in my life. I grew up as an avid "DEVOURER" of books and many are the times when I felt like this inside over something I have read. I would hope that there are other literary sources that can make a person, be it a young male or otherwise that can extract a response that are somewhat more deep than a girlie mag or a peice of jewelry. As someone else who works in the education field (I'm an English teacher), one would hope that we might share the same hope that books themselves are worthy of such a reaction, and the book in question is different for each individual... Nonetheless, I'm grateful for your comment. Definitely something to learn from it... And that's what I'm lookin' for. :)

Do It Yourself, Decorating with feathers!
by tolovemoon

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club
by strangeghost

The first three parts of this critique are written based purely on examination of your photo. "Final thoughts" is written after reviewing your score, photographer's comments, and voter comments.

TECHNIQUE
Nice focus and oof background (but not too oof). Nice control of the tones. The blacks are really black without a loss of detail. The white of the guitar face is awfully big and bland, but there probably wasn't much detail there to begin with, so OK. Tack-sharp with detail on the shoe stitching. My only real technical beef is with the lighting, which looks pretty flat and may have been on-board flash? It's hard to suggest how this might have been better lit though. See comments in composition.

COMPOSITION
I fully realize what a tough challenge this was, with a limited selection of objects to choose from, but this composition leaves me feeling "so what?" A shoe with a feather stuck in it, another feather on a scrunchie (?) and a feather stuck in a guitar. There's no logic or purpose or excitement presented, it's all just kind of there. The unusual angle was an attempt to add some imbalance or drama, but didn't really do it for me. I like the addition of the guitar, but again, it's hard to see the logic that holds them together, other than your title, which leads me to the issue of humor. Is it funny? Well, it's got potential, but you didn't get a belly laugh out of me. My guess is that you were struggling for a response to the challenge and threw this together as a last minute entry. There were probably creative solutions that you could have found to the humor issue, but I can hardly speak to these since I (ahem) didn't enter this challenge. You know what they say about people who live in glass houses not throwing stones...

EMOTIONAL IMPACT
Nope. I don't think so. Technically excellent but emotionally ho-hum.

FINAL THOUGHTS
Your photographer's comment answers my "why" question. I was sorta correct, I guess, about your rush to get an entry together. Your final score of 5.0 is probably a bit of a disappointment, but not bad given the relative indifference of the voters (only 4 comments). Like I said at the outset, this was a tough challenge to enter, and I personally didn't even take a shot, so bravo to you for jumping in.

Forest Spirit masquerading as Chickaree
by hahn23

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club
by strangeghost

The first three parts of this critique are written based purely on examination of your photo. "Final thoughts" is written after reviewing your score, photographer's comments, and voter comments.

TECHNIQUE
Focus and sharpness are great. The tonal range seems a bit flat to me though. The picture has an overall gray feeling to it. That's possibly just what it should be, after all, the only real color is the greenery in the background. However, with snow visible in the leafy foreground, that seems like it's where the white point ought to be. Whatever that white is to the right of the squirrel probably would've blown out then, right?

COMPOSITION
Well obviously it's an adorable animal! I have no idea what that reflection is in the eye. It almost has a face-look to it but for the life of me, I can't make it out. Your title seems to imply that it has some connection with your intent but I'm not sure I get the connection. As for fitting the challenge, it's probably a stretch but the voters have the final say on that. Compositionally, I like the mix of sharp leaves around him and gently blurred background. It looks very natural and in situ.

EMOTIONAL IMPACT
It's a fine shot and one that's generally not easy to acquire, as these animals are pretty twitchy and tend not to sit around long when people are poking around. It's probably not bursting with "wow" to the extent necessary for highly successful DPC shots, but it's definitely nice. The odd reflection in the eye is enough to make me pause and really look closely at what's going on, but doesn't add enough impact to put this pic in the upper crust.

FINAL THOUGHTS
Ah, now I see where the reflection came in, but I really question your decision not to post process. Even in basic editing, you could have adjusted your white and dark points and really made this image scream as far as tonal range. It didn't need any sharpening but could have really used a tweak for the colors and brightness. Your commenters, for the most part, liked the shot, but your final score of 5.5 shows that you scored mostly 5's and 6's with the voters. IMO, not bad for this shot for this challenge.

Amazing!
by eschelar

Comment:
Responding to your plea for "negative" comments.

For me, I just don't buy that there's something in the book that is so amazing. Other ideas? A boy looking at his first girly magazine; a film photographer looking at the price of a dSLR; a woman opening a jewelry box, etc., you get the idea. There has to be something that communicates with the viewer that matches the expression of amazement on the guy's face. For a challenge "literary," I have trouble coming up with a good idea, but that's my take.

and now doth time waste me
by arlanbart

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club
by strangeghost

The first three parts of this critique are written based purely on examination of your photo. "Final thoughts" is written after reviewing your score, photographer's comments, and voter comments.

TECHNIQUE
Focus is great and depth is handled well, adding a nice three-dimensionality to the image. Works very well, IMO. The tones seem to be very mid-range without a lot of true highlights which gives the image a fairly gray feel, but I like it because it fits with the feel of old books and pages. I can almost feel the dustiness and smell the age. Nicely done technically.

COMPOSITION
It's an interesting composition, and I think it works. Books resonate with me and you've chosen a perspective for your composition that is unusual and not often seen. It highlights an aspect of books that is very dear to me, and captures very well the texture of the pages even down to the dust and fiber. Your pic makes me want to run my hand over these books; cradle them in my palms and feel the weight of the ages. I love your title too. Very poetic and thoughtful. I'm usually not a fan of borders, but yours is nicely understated. Usually the best I can say about a border is that it doesn't suck, and yours doesn't suck. Good job. ;-)

EMOTIONAL IMPACT
As stated, this image connects with me. I like it. Would the average voter respond in kind? Without some type of splash or pop, probably not. This is like a very narrow kind of study. Unless the average voter is a bibliophile or has some reason to connect with a close-up of well-aged books, it might not have sufficient impact to be a standout in the field.

FINAL THOUGHTS
Two thoughts: first, the lack of any photograher's comment from you is frustrating. Having spent time studying and trying to critically evaluate your image, it's disheartening to find that you didn't even supply me with any of your own thoughts; what were you aiming for? What feel were you trying to achieve? What is your connection with this image?? Please, when you request a critique, at least do us the honor of leaving your own feelings/frustration/etc. Second, your final score of 5.2 is a little disappointing; I would have thought this would have scored a little higher. You only gathered a few comments, making me think that most voters passed lightly over this one. One commenter (e301) did spend some time though, and touched on some of the same themes that struck me.

Reunited
by Keith Maniac

Comment:
A true product of genius and determination. It's a pleasure to see such creativity on exhibition at this site. Warm congrats Keith!

Statue of Liberty Sunset
by digitalpins

Comment:
Wonderful interpretation and great take on a beautiful sunset.

Cedar Lake Reflection
by brizmama

Comment:
Some unbelievable reflections, there. Superb job!

Bath Time
by jaylen

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club
by strangeghost

The first three parts of this critique are written based purely on examination of your photo. "Final thoughts" is written after reviewing your score, photographer's comments, and voter comments.

TECHNIQUE
Focus isn't perfect, but it is certainly pretty good and probably adequate. Shooting babies and getting fully sharp shots rarely go together anyway. My biggest criticism of this photo is the predominance of gray tones. Soap bubbles are probably white, so it seems as though you would have had plenty of white and black (eyes, hair) portions of this photo to use as calibration points for a true BW tonal range. I like your decision to go for BW with this shot, but leaving everything in shades of gray leaves the image feeling flat. Though size is probably more of a composition issue, I encourage you to use the full 640 pixel dimensions that DPC allows you. Your photo is going to be noticeably smaller than the other entries, and voters usually chafe at that. Lighting seems to be based on the camera flash, and that's almost never the best. The bubbles have lots of possible texture that will disappear in a head-on flash.

COMPOSITION
Babies are smaller than us, and the natural impulse is always to photograph them from above. This is problematic since none of us, babies included, look best from that "birds' eye" perspective. In your shot, you've captured his forehead pretty well, but his whole face, especially the mouth, are so foreshortened that it's tough to really relate to the face. And in babies, lets "face" it, the face is where all the action is. Bring your camera down to his eye level. Lean over the side, get in the tub with him. Set your tripod up in the water (kidding, don't know if I'd do this). Above all, get him to look at the camera. Get him to laugh, to stare in wonder, to hold a bubble in his hand and experience the wonder of life. DPC baby shots fall into two broad categories; quick snaps and wonderful expressions of the world of the child. Unfortunately, this one belongs to the former group.

EMOTIONAL IMPACT
As with all baby shots, the parents and other loved ones usually have the strongest emotional connection, and often fail to see that their shot is not a great one. This shot was a great idea, and had great potential for the challenge topic, but didn't live up to that potential.

FINAL THOUGHTS
Your commenters saw some nice things, but also briefly pointed out some of the shortcomings. Your final score of 5.0 is pretty good, given the technical and compositional problems. Look over some of the higher scoring child and infant shots on this site, and get a flavor for what I'm referring to above. If I were you, I'd reshoot this with some of those ideas in mind. It would be a killer shot and one you'd be happy to share with the relatives.

comfort in the ones we love
by floydrowe

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club
by strangeghost

The first three parts of this critique are written based purely on examination of your photo. "Final thoughts" is written after reviewing your score, photographer's comments, and voter comments.

TECHNIQUE
I think this is a little too dark overall, and the whites don't really look white. Focus is OK, sharpness is OK but it feels a little lackluster because of the dominance of the dark tones.

COMPOSITION
I don't much care for the composition and I'm not sure exactly why. It feels off balance due to the size difference of the two toys and the crop that leaves only the face of the larger and the upper half (?) of the smaller. I have trouble discerning what the purpose of this particular crop and composition is. I also don't readily see a connection to the challenge of 'comfort.' With one facing profile and the other nearly straight on, it has a haphazard appearance, like that of a quick snapshot. Also, with two equally represented objects, I don't know what the subject of the photo is. There might have been other arrangements and perspectives you could have chosen that would have made for a much more interesting composition. I'm not sure the black/white conversion adds anything.

EMOTIONAL IMPACT
Virtually none in my mind. Your title suggests an emotional connection but it is simply not conveyed by the photograph itself. There's really nothing that grabs the attention, sparks the imagination, or stirs the emotions.

FINAL THOUGHTS
Your lack of a photographer's comment is frustrating since it leaves me with no context in which to interpret your motivation or intent. When you ask for a CC member to take the time to critique your photo, please take the time yourself to provide some of your thoughts to let us know what led up to this shot, and what your intent was. Even if it's just to say "last minute entry" or whatever, it helps! The fact that you only gathered three comments, and your final score of 3.98 tells me the voters were as underwhelmed as I was. The photo has decent technical properties, but was lacking in composition and impact. Keep shooting and keep striving.