Spoon Collections
by coatedbtrmlk

Comment:
Amy, I hope you're not discouraged by your first shot's final score. You should definitely keep shooting and keep entering challenges. I look forward to seeing much more of your work here!

DEBT COLLECTION
by meow

Comment:
Brilliant concept! I'd also like to see a much tighter crop - maybe the barrel, trigger area of the gun and a few fragments of playing cards and bills. Really fill the frame with that pistol - great impact!

Spoon Collections
by coatedbtrmlk

Comment:
This picture has wonderful potential, but suffers from some problems that will hurt its scoring in this challenge. It looks like you were shooting in fairly dim light, and your camera used a longer shutter speed to compensate. At that speed, it was unavoidable that your hand moved a bit while the shutter was open, blurring the spoons considerably. It's a shame not to be able to make out the detail present at the ends of the handles, for that surely would have been a great point of interest in your photo. Brace the camera on a steady object or use a tripod when shooting in dim light to avoid that motion blur. You can also bring in some brighter lights, shining them from the side to avoid the glare and reflection that would come from lights above or behind you. Keep shooting and entering challenges!

Green Laser Through A Vase
by Pixlmaker

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club
by strangeghost

COMPOSITION
I like the monochromatic approach, and the liberal use of negative space. The way the rim of the glass seems to float in the void above the pattern is interesting. I wish you had pulled in a little tighter on the glass patterning though. That is an area of visual interest but it seems a little indistinct. Though I like the square crop, I might have recommended chopping a little more of the space from above the rim and to the sides (notwithstanding my comment about negative space above)

TECHNIQUE
An ambitious attempt here. Black background, unusual lighting and light source, and a stark minimalist approach combine to make a shot stand or fall on visual appeal and technical merit. Your bold use of black space leaves very little detail upon which to hang things like focus, sharpness, etc. There's not enough detail in the glass etching to really tell if focus is good or not. I think you might have tried for a little bit more light - either supplementing the laser light with another light source, or playing the laser light around the glass during your exposure ("painting" the glass), or even backlighting with the laser. As shot, there is so little detail that the eye is left with a relative vacuum of focal points.

OVERALL IMPACT
I really want to like this image a lot more than I do, and I suspect that voters agreed with this sentiment, given your 4.79 final score. I sense a lot of unfulfilled potential in this shot. I wonder if you experimented with a macro effect, zooming in on the etched pattern? I wonder if you looked at other points of view, and as suggested above, more and different light and lighting effects?



Fairly minimalist voter comments, which tells me you likely got tons of quick 4-5 votes and moved on. DPC really demands that you capture the voters' attention and give them some initial "wow." I think your shot had the potential to do that, but fell short of the goal. Keep shooting and keep trying for interesting effects like this.

IMG_1211.jpg
by Terramar

Comment:
Beautiful shot but IMO some unrealized potential. I'd stretch the dynamic range a bit (I'd use curves, but there are other ways) and bump the saturation too. This could be a jaw-dropping wow-shot.

Shannons
by jeffzoet

Comment:
Very nice work with the lighting. Because of the limitations of the triptych size, I might have considered a head or torso-up shot instead of full body. She's stunning and all three shots are well done. Nice contribution to the challenge!

Cold Morning
by Jadelee

Comment:
I'm proud of you Jade. You have a photograher's eye. Keep shooting!

Guiding Light
by Stang

Comment:
What is that? If that's a badly sensor bloomed sunset than for shame. If it's a rocket launch from the Cape or Vandenburg, than bravo! I can't wait to read the note on this image.

Transparent Ripples
by MattO

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club
by strangeghost

COMPOSITION
An unusual and eye-catching take on the challenge! At first glance you assume the person is underwater (cool!) but then it dawns that you've used a transparent dish of some type (still cool!). The comp is pretty straightforward, mostly centered, with a little perspective distortion and a lot of water distortion. The rippled distortions of the face are interesting and tend to draw attention to the center. The left elbow is chopped much more than the right, and the space at the top gives an overall unbalanced feel.

TECHNIQUE
There are a couple of lighting issues that really weaken the photo IMO. First, the awful reflective glare at the bottom right, and scattered elsewhere, e.g., the forehead, are huge distractions and should have been avoided by more careful lighting and subject placement. The second issue is the white balance, which is off causing there to be no really white areas of the image that seem as though they ought to be white (bottom half of shirt). These are enough to decrease the appeal of a photo in a challenge alone. The profusion of bubbles didn't help you either. Rather than pouring water to achieve your rippled effect, I wonder if you had experimented with dropping drops or simply doing a little gentle sloshing with the container you had suspended over the subject? The bubbles pretty much overpower the ripples for me.

OVERALL IMPACT
Decent visual impact upon initial look, but then the distracting elements begin to take their toll. You're final score of 4.85 most likely reflects the voters concluding as well that this was a photo lacking that punch or pop that DPC challenges seem to demand. Most of your commenters certainly seemed to appreciate your shot - as did I, but many mentioned the same problems I did. This is the type of shot that I believe has great potential if you have the patience to work out the kinks in setup and in post-processing. Eliminate the distractions, perfect the composition - simple and clean, make the colors pop, etc. Good attempt and please keep shooting!

Crystal Clear Water For A Morning Duckling Dip...
by rosco

Comment:
Greetings from the Critique Club
by strangeghost

COMPOSITION
Though an attractive, slightly off-center composition is better than dead-center in most cases, I think here you might have done better if you had zoomed in slightly tighter on the duckling and filled the frame a bit more. However, your title indicates that you intend the water to be an essential part of the composition, so I guess you did what you had to do. I would also argue against the square crop. A landscape orientation would have given a more pleasing use of space. Given that the duckling's body is partly submerged, you have, pardon the pun, an odd duck. I wonder how many of your voters paused long enough to realize that he's just emerging from the water so we're missing the tail? Too bad his head is pointed obliquely away. Might have been stronger if we had a more visible face with expression. Faces are good in animal shots.

TECHNIQUE
Ducky's highlights are very blown. Your exposure was perfect for the water, which was fatal for his white feathers. Focus looks better on the water than the duck (who was probably in rapid motion). I think the water is a bit too green as well. Bump the blues a bit in sat.

OVERALL IMPACT
This picture probably lacked the punch and initial visual appeal that is so essential in DPC challenges. Instead of the duck in mid-dive, a more sedentary pic of a pretty duckling paddling along would probably have had significant cuteness that this shot lacks. Also, the facing away/facing toward the camera is imperative in animal shots. Most of your commenters picked up on the same stuff. Though many liked the shot (and thus stopped to comment), you probably got a huge majority of pause and vote 4-5 and move on. To make the voters stop, you've got to rock them with visual appeal, popping colors, and (in the case of animal shots) personality. Keep shooting and good luck!