Leaf Wraps Rock, Rock Breaks Fingers, Rock Wins
by Zed Pobre

Comment:
Thanks to sabphoto for the most useful comments.

Some additional notes:

I wrote up a post-mortem on this entry with more detail on what I learned and what I should have entered, but there were a few things I should note about some of the comments that were made.

The shot wasn't originally of the rock itself, but of someone setting up the rock to take a picture of it. I was contemplating concepts that might work for my first DPChallenge submission and ended up choosing that photo and one other for having interesting rocks, then picked the colorful rock over the other shot that was technically much superior, but seemed more commonplace:



I liked that the hands were blurry because it fit the general idea of dodging a dropped rock (rock breaks fingers). Same with the floating fingers. Even if I had wanted to go with full hands, I wouldn't have had much room to move, though: the area to the left of the rock was very distracting, and the camera was visible just off the right side of the crop. I could have added room above or below, but there wasn't anything interesting. Thus, I also couldn't get up any larger. The shot just wasn't close enough.

Because I never ended up comparing the shot at the proper resolution to others I've taken (the thumbnail looked okay, and although it did look off when I viewed it full screen, I originally attributed that just to scaling), I didn't realize how bad it was. I thought it was just a touch on the off side until I actually saw it in place, and by then it was too late.

Also, we really do get bright mud and rocks in Louisiana. One person actually uses some of the muds mixed with egg as pigment for his paintings.

Spools
by Shannon

Comment:
I would have recommended reducing the aperture to get a better depth of field. The eye is naturally drawn to the bright yellow one, but unfortunately it's already slightly outside of the focal range. Alternatively, focusing there and blurring the near and the far parts might also have worked well.

I do like the colors.

Albino Peacock 3
by Shannon

Comment:
There is probably no way to take a picture of an albino peacock such that it doesn't come out harshly white, so I can't really critizice the shot for that, even though the center is a little hard on the eyes. Composition is good, but I must agree with Rachel about the border. It's not subtle, doesn't really fit, and detracts from the image.

found it....at last
by Femme du monde

Comment:
I'm not fond of pure black backgrounds, but it works well here. Since the focus is the light, which looks almost mystical, it's okay that the face is out of focus as well.

Here's Lookin' at You Kid
by shabri9

Comment:
That close, the eye is surreal. Colors are fantastic. Blown highlights are a little distracting, however.

Full Moon and a New Pope.
by docpjv

Comment:
Striking colors. The background is overly simple, however. Leaving some stars in would have helped, if possible.

Big Bird Ruling the Sky
by Jyoti

Comment:
Colors are interesting, but the scene is out of focus and very noisy. Try picking up a copy of Noise Ninja.

A. Eagle
by Avis

Comment:
Subject isn't very visible. Nothing draws the eye to it, and there isn't really anything interesting about the image as a whole.

Blue skies and pretty flowers on a spring day!
by tolovemoon

Comment:
Contrast is pushed a bit too high on this, making it hard to look at. Flower seems a little out of focus.

Break the darkness
by BMacD

Comment:
I normally don't like monotone backgrounds, but this seems to work well.