Portrait of a artist
by djonson

Comment:
Technicaly pretty assured, though i would have the flash far softer a light than this - its produced heavy strange shadows, and some glare on her forehead and around the eye: I'm not asking for over the top airbrush flattery, but just a smoother, more realistic light. Love the situation though, neatly seen and shot.

Red Hair Day
by gsal

Comment:
Quite fun. Good detail, great light, competent framing and so on. Selective de-sat always bothers me, I'm never quite sure why. Perhaps not taking the de- side of things to the full extreme might be more impactful without my feeling that my attention is being forced onto the hair when it would be there anyway? Not sure - I get the impact, sure, and I almost see the point, but I don't like the level of - well, manipulation - it feels like I'm being subjected to.

Ice Square
by IceRock

Comment:
Too much ice, not enough location/context? I don't know if your idea ws to find interest in the light through the ice, but framing os closely the whole piece doesn't work in that sense for me, and yet it's so closely framed that I get no sense of location.

Memorial Arch - Valley Forge
by panynj

Comment:
decent enough detail, and focus, and so on, but to me simply an architectural portrait - telling me very little, affecting me likewise very little. Whilst the exposure is 'correct' in the sense of nothing is over- and nothing is under-exposed, the overall brightness of this is taken too far: you'd get more impact, more sense of the true depth of colour of the stone, more drama to the shot if you were to lower the overall brightness level - just try adjusting with levels and moving the slider to the right a bit, just to give it some punch. A perfectly fine, ut an unexciting entry.

Just Nuts
by sfarrell23

Comment:
Not bad. The depth of field is possibly a bit arbitrary - somehere in that region between deep and shallow, and might happily have been a bit more in either direction. I think I get your point with the composition, but I don't think the thirds rule applies so strongly to a square crop, and the space a bottom of frame seems left there only to make the image square, rather than this set-up requiring a square crop to work, if you follow me.

Restless Tide...
by dolphnz8

Comment:
Too much detail lacking to my eye - perhaps processing to keep control of the highlights in the stone, or maybe just more shutter speed needed, I think. The diagonal makes for a strong composition for the required crop, however, which shows good vision.

Soft
by shanksware

Comment:
I'm no fan of this kind of portrait - simply too gooey for my taste. hiowever, this is a very professionally done version. Bringing the hands more into frame would have suited this crop more, I think. The 'rules' pertaining to square frames are a bit different from otherwise, favouring the symmetrical and diagonal compositions - which you nearly get to, but not quite. More of a parallel between the line of her face and shoulder, and the lines of her hands and arms, set diagonally across frame would make a very strong composition.

Windmill at Dusk
by Nigel

Comment:
The sharpening artefacts around the sails are a shame - really quite eye-catching. Might I recommend that you not shoot against the bright part of the sky in this instance? That's left you with an enormous brightness gap to bridge between keeping detail in the windmill and the sky - the opposing angle, shooting from the right of this frame, would have allowed you to keep the entire shot within the dynamic range of your camera more easily. Obviously, there may be other factors preventing such a shot - but that very bright area of sky has certainly caused problems.

A Safe Subject
by GeneralE

Comment:
Interesting idea, pretty neatly executed - almost pulls off that effect of seeming to be sunk into the screen - however there's a slight tilt to things - whether real or the result of some illusion, it's enough to disturb the impact of this shot for me - the more disturbing perhaps, for being so slight?

Speed
by tcmartin

Comment:
Works compositionally for the square frame, and has a sense of motion of course. Lacks some permanent part of image against which to judge that motion, maybe? Something to bring it away slightly from the pure abstract and really give it a bit of impact?