Lotion up!
by taylorbehne

Comment:
There's a difference between 'motion blur in part of a shot to show speed' and 'entire picture blurry,' I'm afraid. Her face, in particular, is disturbingly not-quite-in-focus.

TraFFic JaM
by Antithesis

Comment:
Doesn't look very speedy to me, I'm afraid. IMHO, YMMV, etc. It just doesn't work for me for this challenge.

Fast Food
by laurenrhae

Comment:
Looks like a motion blur for a motion blur's sake, and also murky (as if it were at the bottom of a bottle of chlorine gas). Sorry, just doesn't work for me.

High Speed Standoff
by kblm

Comment:
If this were a little crisper/less grainy, this could well be a 9 from me. Unfortunately, as it is, it's like looking at it through dirty glass. :-/ 6.

Another Cold One
by miller

Comment:
The play of light in this takes my breath away, and the first glance brings out the connection with the topic immediately (to me, anyway). The lighting is so damn amazing. If I have to find SOMETHING critical to say, I would add that I don't see what the border brings to it (just letting the edge end blackly would work as well, to me). :-> 10.

Baby Brother
by greenem2

Comment:
I love this image as a portrait, and as 'portrait' or 'kids' or 'direct gaze' or some such topic, it could get a 9 or 10 from me. However, the topic isn't blatantly obvious as you look at it (other than 'boy', I suppose), without the title's explanation, so that detracts from it a bit for me in this competition (YMMV, IMHO, pant pant). 6.

B is for Barbers in Black and white
by EddyG

Comment:
Hmm. There's a kind of busy-ness in the similarity of mid-grey tones - perhaps a slightly different angle when shot could have gotten the barbers against the mirror, or just one barber with a less muddled background or surroundings to distract the eye from where you want it to go? 5 (fits topic well enough, no glaring technical flaws, but not eye-catchingly appealing either).

Bowls
by FranziskaLang

Comment:
Finally, a *good* use of high-key! Man. I get kind of frustrated with people washing out their shots and trying to be stylish. This is a use I approve of, however. Makes a gorgeous abstract out of something that clearly fits the topic on first glance (title unneeded to explain). 10.

Bottle
by Sixtyfour

Comment:
Well, technically, you made the *cork* the center and main focus of the image, but. :-> 7,

Bloom in the rain
by Crafty Sue

Comment:
This is rather unfortunately fuzzy-and-grainy. Maybe a slightly smaller image size (or less jpg compression?) could have turned it from 'flawed' to 'meeting the challenge but unobjectionable technically' - which to me is the difference between 4 and 5.