Thunder Heads over Spokane Valleyby
brchambeComment by KaDi: Greetings from the Critique Club and welcome to DPC!
You have chosen a potentially pretty piece of scenery for your first entry. It appears to have been taken on a pleasant day with a dramatic sky. You have used the arch to frame what seems to be a lovely landscape in its summer prime.
The main issue I have with this image is its apparent lack of subject. There is no one part of the image that tells me what to look at. The archway is a strong shape but what does it frame? My eye starts down the stairs and path...but ends up nowhere in particular. The scenery itself is detailed and too complex to have a point of rest for the eye. The sky is somewhat interesting and contrasty...perhaps if the framing mostly contained the sky? If the clouds, as suggested by your title, were the subject you were aiming for, then a lower point of view that eliminated much of the path and valley might have been the ticket.
Often, setting an image in black and white helps to simplify an image...here it acts as a frustration--I suspect there are lovely hues there, but they've been removed. I think the flowers lining the path and the flowering bush may have provided a fairly suitable subject but they were lost to the B&W conversion.
As one of your commenters suggested, the focus seems soft. Even though you've used a narrow aperature which could set nearly everything in focus, nothing seems sharp at all. My guess is that you might need to use "sharpening" in post-process--it's a common edit that most DSLr's require.
I hope you don't find my comments too harsh. The first challenge is usually the hardest. (I remember having been happy to have just figured out how to upload an image.) Keep shooting and, above all, have fun!
--Kadi
Photographer found comment helpful.