Awaiting the winds
by Schnitz

Comment:
The light blue sky, darker water, paler beach, and diagonal shoreline go well with the boat. Moving to the left, if possible, to shift the dark branches away from the boat might be an improvement. I see the walking people as a distraction in a potentially more artistic image.

Tres Tulipanes Morado
by dtremain

Comment:
The colors and water droplets are nice. It might be worthwhile experimenting with different positions to separate the flowers more and maybe increase depth of field a little.

Building Bonds
by ltlmschrisss

Comment:
After absorbing the title and looking a while, I see where the idea of a sweet image is lurking. However, shallow depth of field and lack of color clues makes it hard for the actual image to convey the intent.

Emerald
by Kelli

Comment:
Nice set of curving green forms in the main subject. Background seems oversaturated, and recent run of challenge entries using green snakes like this one reduce the sense of originality.

On th Canal Bank
by Marston

Comment:
Peaceful impression. I get the feeling of competition for subject matter. If the boat is important, having it as a bigger part of the composition would help. If it is not important, waiting a little bit unitl it is gone then backing up a bit to get a full reflection (in calmer water) would be a valid alternative.

Take me home please
by Shutter-For-Hire

Comment:
Dead center composition seems weak in this case because the image area aside from the main subject are not very interesting. Consider a mcuh closer crop, and perhaps a color balance adjustment to reduce what to my eyes appears to be a mild magenta color cast.

Calvin
by phreak

Comment:
Soft puppy has appeal, but it might help to crop away the dark patch at lower left (hind haunch?) and to use post processing techniques to make the background less distracting.

Odd couple
by Woodward

Comment:
Chance juxtaposition of mallard and wood duck noted. Unfortunately, the background is very distracting with the scattered high contrast dead leaves and the green bits of needle branches competing for attention. Perhaps selective partial desaturation and darkening of all the image aside from the ducks (and maybe duck reflection) might help some.

deadly embrace
by roz

Comment:
This is very similar to the recent "Nightmare" challenge blue ribbon entry, perhaps with higher quality processing. I would expect a fair number of low votes based on this no longer being fresh and original but instead a revisit of a previously successful image. This version might be better for a print than the earlier version, but the grim content would probably limit sales.

Shot Heard Round the World
by hmurmur

Comment:
Nice variety of action in this reenactment image. Near the center of the image we have a distracting patch of bright color with magenta/green/orange speckles, consistent with chroma noise also seen in the blue coats and grass. I wonder if this is associated with a high ISO setting that might have been lower with a wider apeture and different shutter speed. Consider a salvage attempt with one of the many available noise reduction software approaches.