Insight
by silverfeather

Comment by Revecca:
Beautiful portrait, a bit on the light side, but its not overblown and it looks very flawless.
I like the way the pins in her hair stand out, making her (and this image) look very classic and beautiful.
The DOF really works for you here also, as the bokeh makes her face and expression stand out a lot.

Insight
by silverfeather

Comment by dbosse:
Split profile, too much of back (right) eye showing... should only see the eyelash, body (shoulders) is awkward looking. Bobby pins in hair are distracting.

Insight
by silverfeather

Comment by sinistral_leo:
"Insight"? "an instance of apprehending the true nature of a thing, especially through intuitive understanding"
Nice pic, but wouldn't insight be a non-five sense?

Insight
by silverfeather

Comment by sfalice:
Classic profile and nice tones.
If it was mine, I'd probably ask the model to conceal some of those hairpins,
or maybe just crop the pic a different way.

But it's not mine, it's yours and this is a good one.

Insight
by silverfeather

Comment by doremi:
Like the soft focus. Not sure about this photo for this challenge.

she stays when everyone else leaves
by silverfeather

Comment by tnun:
Lovely image. The girl and the horse do well together.

she stays when everyone else leaves
by silverfeather

Comment by insteps:
Nice story here and I like your composition.

she stays when everyone else leaves
by silverfeather

Comment by tanguera:
Very moving.

The Factory
by silverfeather

Comment by FrankRobinson:
Hi Cailin - welcome to the Critique Zone!

This has all the makings of an absolutely cracking shot but somewhere along the way it loses just a little of the impact, which is - I suspect - what hit the vote a little.

Technical: It would be interesting to know what camera / lens you used and what the settings were (you state the E-10 and the Nikkor lens, but that doesn't add up, and that lens can't shoot at f2.8) - so I'm afraid my advice will be a bit generic. Your 70-300 may be the best lens to use for this, but I would have been tempted to try the 24-70 too, just getting a bit closer. For a subject like this, you really need to keep the speed up (1/500 is good!) but getting this close the aperture needs to be at least about f8 to get the depth of field that you need - so controlling the ISO (not leaving it on auto) is important. The camera's autofocus will often not choose the best point of focus when doing serious close ups like this, so I would probably go with manual focus or shoot several on autofocus to try and get a keeper if the subject is moving. Really, both the whole bee and the near side of the flower need to be in focus. The other risk is of getting within the lens's minimum focus distance (probably 1.3m or more for the 70-300) and losing the shot that way.

PP: There is a lot to be dragged out of this shot in post-processing (PP). I would always aim to sharpen a bit, and a little more contrast (try using curves rather than brightness/contrast) and saturation would have lifted the shot too.

Artistically: This is completely subjective, but... for what it's worth, this is where this shot really scores. The composition is very strong - both with the placement of the subject flower and bee, but also with the background flowers (which a greater DoF would leave blurred but more obvious, helping the structure) and the (chance?) use of complimentary colours (purple / green) which is very pleasing.

The bad news is that this shot needs some help technically, the (very) good news from where I'm sitting is that you have a great eye for composition and structure - and it's much easier to learn the technicals than develop an artistic eye. So, I expect to see some great things from you shortly! Above all, practice makes perfect.

Happy hunting,

Frank.

The Factory
by silverfeather

Comment by Tiny:
Seems to be out of focus.