Photo Critique #176

Photo Critique #176

on Feb 15th 2013 with 5 comments

Friday Photo Critique is our weekly community project, where we publish a photograph submitted by one of our wonderful readers, then ask you all to offer constructive feedback on the image. It’s a great way to learn more about photography, express your viewpoint, and have your own image critiqued!

Quick Ground Rules

  1. Play nice! We’ve deliberately chosen photographs that aren’t perfect, so please be constructive with any criticism.
  2. Feel free to offer any type of advice – composition, lighting, post-processing etc.
  3. You can also link to photographs that you feel offer a great example of this type of image shot exceptionally well.

Without further ado, here is this week’s candidate for Friday Photo Critique!

The Photograph

IMG_0288

Photo Details & Inspiration

  • Canon Rebel T3i
  • 55mm
  • 1/250
  • f/10
  • ISO 100

I was wandering around where I live. The cotton was about to be harvested. The red chile was also ready for harvest.

I wanted to capture and contrast both these cash crops as a statement of value for Las Cruces and Southern New Mexico. To me, the beauty of these natural products convey a dramatic contrast in color, yet both are important. This was my first try into using photography as an art form.

Photographer: Barry Fisher

Please let us know what you think in the comments – how would you have approached the scene or taken the photo differently? A massive thank you to everyone who commented last week.

The most constructive and helpful comments will be featured on the site. Interested in submitting your own photo? You can do so here!

 
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By

Rollover to read this author's bio or click through to see a full list of posts by this author.

I was raised in the suburbs of Cincinnati, Ohio. After high school, I left for Western Kentucky University where I obtained degrees in photojournalism and cultural anthropology. I am currently employed by CityBeat, an arts and entertainment weekly in Cincinnati. The work I am doing here is very rewarding and I suspect it will continue to be. I am available for freelance work in all areas of photography.  

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  • Bill F

    Barry, I think this is a great first effort and I like your idea of combining the two cash crops. While I’m no expert, some thoughts on how you might improve the photo. To me the cotton boll on the lower left is really bright and draws my eye away from the subject. At a minimum I would crop it out. Also, on my monitor the pepper almost looks like it is floating rather than resting on the cotton bolls, almost as if it were pasted on top of the image of the cotton. I believe if you lowered your camera and shot more straight at the cluster of bolls with the pepper resting on them it might be more appealing. For a shot like this I really like to really blur the background so I would probably open the lens fully but that’s just a personal thing and others will probably disagree. I think you are on the right track and would like to see more of your work in the future.Bi

  • Sri

    The cotton is losing its importance in the photo amidst the bright chilli on top. May be a different angle would have ensured that both would get their due importance in the photograph.

  • Peewee

    I really liked this as an idea – but as I looked I did start to agree on the redness of the chilli drawing the eye from the cotton. If I had one other criticism it’s that the central “characters” are just a bit too large in the frame and the background could be more out of focus.

    Still think it’s a striking picture though

  • bikingbadger

    Interesting idea. As already mentioned I think that by changing the angle a bit lower you’d get a different perspective on the image. The other thing I might have done is to get more of those balls of cotton into the background.

  • http://www.wix.com/simonabarbu1/simonabarbuphotography Simona Dumitru

    I thought it was a chile ( not a very looking one although you meant you convey harvest ) on snow. It is actually cotton. I do not think the composition works, and I do not see the contrast in colors that powerful.