Good effect in gewneral but the sharpness is a bit too far off on the insect. You had little chance at this size with f5.6 but a standard zoom does not work well on tubes either and sharpness is likely to be the first failing. You needed f11 or f16 and that would have given both depth of field and used a point nearer the lens sweet point.

If you like macro, and can't afford a macro lens, put a 50mm standard fixed focal length on your tubes.

Paul

Mixed feelings. this is a good shot but I'm not sure it shows movement that well as it is difficult to tell what is moving. OK, it's obviously a train due to the station but I think it would need some substance - the train is actually very much in the distance. The impression of movement would be more pronounced with the light trails leading to a more substantial train.

Not easy to do. You could have tried firing a flash from a powerful gun mid way through your 6 sec exposure - the train would then have recorded with the flash as a ghostly sharp object? Not easy and if you don't enter, you wont win.

Try it.

Paul

Your actual choice of sky is wrong - it doesn't fit the image at the bottom right and is too bright. The technique doesn't look far out though. I would have placed your son a little further onto the grass and to the left, also cloning out the blue post. Otherwise quite a strong image. I have a file with hundreds of sky shots in it built up over many years - different times of the day and angles.

Paul

My iniyial thought was nice but flat. Then it grew on me. The colours are muted but seem to work well and I don't find the top too light. I do think there are several images in this one shot - you could play with saturation, some burning in, contrast and other treatments. Many would result in good stand alone images.

what I would try and not do is use pre-sets - it can work, and has here, but making the adjustments yourself are what it is all about.

Paul

You need to be using much smaller apertures for this kind of thing as depth of field is minimal this close. You are also focusing too close to the camera - only the bottom left corner is sharp enough. Macro is very difficult - to get enough light, no shake, small aperture and highest quality is difficult. Flash can help but can also look artificial.

However, to get quality, depth and sharpness you may have to use flash - many do.

Paul

Good effort. I would just prefer a little less exposure - you used +1/3 but I think it wasn't needed here. Easily darkened in software.

Paul

I rather like this - my kind of shot. I'm wondering about the two part glasses - do they serve to hold the picture in at the edges or should it just be the main three? Not sure, think I would like a cropped version as much as this.

Paul

Niot sure how HDR works with a moving subject. This is an effective image but something looked un-natural when I first viewed it - not unpleasant though. May be the HDR effect because it doesn't look like classic HDR - which I rarely like. I think the industrial area is a touch light and needs some burning in with a bit cropped off the sky.

Paul

A perfectly good record shot. I would just run the burn tool across the top with special attention to the top right corner.

paul

I rather like this. Interesting. I would crop the bottom a bit to remove the orange bar and, although I don't normally bother, I would just correct the verticals on the right edge.

Paul

Now, this is my kind of image - but without the sky. It's pretty good as it is, but if you crop the whole sky off, the foreground looks much stronger with more impact. Nicely seen.

Paul

This is a perfectly good image showing how good modern phones can be for general photography. Ideally you needed rather more flower and rather less leaves. Don't know if the phone would focus that close but there is a rule - fill the frame. Rules are there to be broken, but I think it would work here.

paul

This is my kind of image - simple and appealing. However, a couple of points. You need the girl slightly nearer the left bottom third. You then need a very heavy top crop, even more than the mod for me. How did you do HDR without either more than one exposure, or a RAW starting file?

But, the basis for a really superb image is there.

paul

There is unlikely to be any polarised light in this scene, so the polariser became a totally unecessary ND filter. That added to your long 1/30 exposure which has resulted in the blur from camera movement. I'm assuming you didn't use a tripod - you must at these settings - or some kind of support.

You are also over exposed by about a stop and needed a bit of contrast adding. Always check your LCD after each exposure, it will tell you if the exposure is wrong and you can do something about it straight away. These wonderful modern metering systems can fail - and often do. The more complex your image, the more likely is an exposure failure and the preponderance of frame have caused the over exposed central area.

Paul

No info to go on, and not close up/macro. A decent image spoilt only by the burn out on the arm and top of the head. Difficult to comment without focal length, exposure etc. Lighting was obviously very bright with the face in shadow. Could crop quite tight to just the face, or, depending on gear, distance etc. - use a burst of flash on taking, exposing for the highlights with the flash filling the shadows - the face.

paul

Perfectly good record. To get the best from such as this you need to get in closer and fill the frame with backlit water - thus getting some twinkle and impact.

paul

This is potentially superb, but the original has a strong magenta cast and your conversion is too contrasty. I applaud the strong hard image, but you have nipped the tonal range too much. Why did you use second curtain on the flash - it will make no difference at all in this type of shot. That setting delays flash firing until just before the second bliind curtain starts it's travel - only of use on longer exposures.

Paul

First, this is a fine image in every respect. A difficult subject well shown and technically the highest quality. I was a PAGB judge for many years - got fed up with travelling finally and the shear bloody mindedness of many club members who thought they were good - until I got there. Different people will give different marks and it's nothing to do with camera clubs, just look at opinions in this critique section. Technically there should be few arguments, subjectively, as Tony says, you have no idea what will happen.

I got shouted at a few times. After many years as a production manager in the Steel industry it simply rolled off me, but you eventually get fed up.

Were the competitions specialist or general? If just NH you have one outlook, if general you have another. I never bother with points or awards on this site - it depends what you take and your best chance of high marks here is to shoot landscape - something I rarely do.

In my club days we used to enter images for two reasons - good critique when we knew we had a good judge coming and if prizes/trophies were at stake, we researched who the judge was and what they liked.

Unfair? not if it was a worthwhile prize1 you simply have no real idea what wil win. i sometimes judged on spec at the club - the winner, I'm sure, would be different to if I had the work at home for a week to look at. Instant impact can win. Superb quality can win.

Don't bother about it. I enter the odd competition still and int he past did quite well. I like to get comment - after 50 years I can still accept a need to learn.,

I've looked at your work - some really nice stuff, but quite specialist and you are in an area where the good are very very good indeed.

In short - there is no formula. Type of competition matters, brief matters, number of entries matters etc. etc. But, if you get one that does well, try it everywhere. I have a shot taken in 1986 which I keep bringing back. It has been on calenders, won cameras and other gear and it always seems to do well - because it is simple, strong and very none specialist.

paul

Potentially nice, but several problems. A tighter crop would remove that over bright background and the face is a little dark. The main problem is a lack of sharpness. You have used a very low shutter speed and I assume hand held. You willget blur due to shake at 1/13 sec and either needed flash, but difficult this close, better lighting, or ramp up the ISO - sensitivity of the sensor. I would look for better lighting if possible.

paul

Hello Bobby,

The idea and composition is good - a lot of impact. You don't give any details, but the edge is just off the sharpness across the image. I guess a reasonably small aperture due to a good depth of field, but the crispness is not there. Sharpness is easily lost when reducing size, so it is the original that counts.

You may need a bit more agressive sharpening. Try 200% at a pixel dimension of 2 or 3. The strength of sharpening depends on the resolution of the image. You can get away with with larger % with high resolution images,but be careful of higher pixel or threshold settings. You can usually tell if you are over sharpening - you start to get white lines on hard edges.

Paul