kids

Terrific photo -- the one "Kilory was here" eye in the left corner makes it something special.

Fantastic meaningful image.

nice portrait and bouquet; anyhow that eye in the corner makes it special

heinz

Very good take on this pair.I like the assurance of the front one while the other is reassured by the presence of her friend onto whom she's holding on symboliquely by the hand on the shoulder.Good full eye contact,the glint and of course,the 5th eye in the corner.B/W is the right choice for this excellent image.Bravo and I am borrowing for my favorites.

Salutations-Laurent

Nice portrait

Best regards

Xavier Corcobado

xcorcobado.blogspot.com

like♥♥♥

Love the composition. The expressions on the two at right are very good. The eye looking back on the mostly hidden face makes this shot.

All those light circles, for me, make the background seem busy and don't help separate the subjects from the back

I love the two children on the right - especially the far right - her (his?) expression is worthy of a Sally Mann masterpiece. But I have to disagree with just about everybody else who's commented (which probably means I'm wrong, you SHOULD drink the coolaid) - I absolutely hate the fifth eye in the left hand corner. It just makes me feel like I'm missing out. I want to see the whole not just the top right hand corner of his/her head!

I do, however agree with one of the previous comments suggesting taking down the background a little - the bokeh is just a tiny bit too intrusive.

IMHO the best thing to do is to go for a tighter crop because lets face it, with these two faces you've got a world class image anyway. Fabulous pic and thanks for submitting it!

No, you're not wrong at all. Actually, I like your crop. I'm a fan of tight cropping anyhow. At first, I felt the same; not liking the eye and partial face at left. It eventually grew on me

I agree totally with Graham.  The two girls are framed well with great expressions.  The third person in the lower left looks like a viewfinder mistake, IMO.

I think that if more of the figure on the left were included though still with under emphasis and perhaps with a narrower crop: then the photograph would convey more than as re-cropped above, and which it almost says as it is cropped. This photo to me can potentially say more than 'aren't they pretty" and I want it to say more than just that.

Charles, you make a very good point, and I agree with you.  We all want our photos to be more than "just snapshots," and we want our photos to be more original than is so commonly seen.  The crop, while still interesting to my eye, is a typical photo that many might take in a setting like this.  It seems to me that this desire to be different or to be unique has been taken so far that any variance, any anomaly, or anything that is hardly ever seen in a baseline traditional shot is instantly accepted for its uniqueness and given high praise for that feature that makes it unique.  I agree that more of the person in the lower left could have added much to this photograph, but the inclusion of only an eye and a small portion of the head above the eye is just not enough.  To me, it's the same as those who push the saturation sliders to achieve absolutely unique color combinations, unique because they don't exist in the real world, and who then receive comments about the "great colors" for their landscape photograph (it's another matter, however, if the image is offered as a digital alteration rather than a landscape photograph, IMO).  Being different just for the sake of being different isn't enough, IMO; a good photograph needs more than that.  

I kind of liked the "fifth" eye at first, but after considering it, I think I agree that it's a little out of place. Nevertheless, the crop that was posted seems to  me to be much too severe and throws the balance completely out of whack. I think the left eye of the girl in the center of the frame needs to stay about centered. 

I quickly edited out the the face at the lower left and then cropped just a little bit off the left side.

Martin, while I don't like to remove things (although I do from time to time), I think allowing more space on the left is a good decision (in language that's often used, it gives the girls space to "look into") -- it improves the photo of the two girls aesthetically, IMO.  A possible alternative (one that I haven't tried) might be to crop the person in the lower left corner, and then just a bit off the top to achieve the desired aspect ratio (that might also get the eyes out of the center, which also might improve the aesthetics while not changing the basic nature of the photograph).  I'm trying to balance what many folks consider to be aesthetic considerations with aspects of the photo that preserve what Ian originally saw and wanted to capture, along with what many viewers might find especially appealing and perhaps unique about this photo.  However, I'm very likely to run into conflicting subjective preferences in doing this -- there are several possibilities, and each may appeal to different people.

Ian, a very nice photo. It has warmth and heart.

I wouldn't crop it. Cropping it removes personality and Ian's point of view, as well as a whole visual statement about point of view.

There is, perhaps, something disquieting about the eye in the corner. That's why I appreciate it.

If Ian used this kind of edge-of-the-frame device over and over in his portfolio, it could become sort of gimmicky. As this is the only photo that does this among Ian's work, I accept it as is and feel it's very much part of how the photo works and what struck Ian about the scene. Cropping it strips it of its individuality and personality.

It does not seem like a case of a photographer wanting to be different just for the sake of it. I don't get that either from the photo or from Ian's larger body of work.

I appreciate the fifth eye not merely because it's different but because it connects to the rest of the photo, almost ricocheting off the other eyes, setting up a kind of energy and connection that I think the simpler cropped portrait of the two people does not have. I think it takes it out of the league of a portrait of two kids and makes it more about kids per se. It speaks to me also of playfulness, shyness, and ever-presence.

Fred, you may be right. Also, after taking a quick look at the accomplished work in Ian's portfolio, I no longer think that eye no. 5 just happened into the frame accidentally, which I suspected was the case originally. 

Thanks for all the feedback.

I was just photographing the girls and it wasn't till editing that I saw the eye. As this wasn't a work shot, I left it in for a laugh.

There are a bunch more from this little essay here. And a colour version here.  

If the fifth eye (sounds like a great title for a novel) was not initially seen when photographed and left in for a laugh, that sounds more like an accident rather than an intentional point of view.

I am wary of allowing my own vision of a photo to be too influenced by info I get from the photographer. The fifth eye, for me, works the way I described it, whether it was an accident or intentional. Obviously, it was not originally included in the shot intentionally, but it was left in intentionally. It's perfectly reasonable that Ian would say it was more or less for a laugh. But I'm looking at the photo. I did see playfulness in that eye in the corner, as I said. But, regardless of why Ian left it in, it still strikes me a certain way, the way I described it above. The photographer can only tell us what he thinks. He cannot tell us how to see the photo. The great thing about accidents is that they often happen for a reason and, even if they don't and are completely serendipitous, they often have profound effects on the photo. That something happens by accident or serendipitously and that the photographer may see it as a bit of whimsy does not mean a viewer can't take it seriously or at least talk about the impact that accident has on the shot. The other great thing about making photos is that the photographer rarely gets all the credit. Nature gets credit, the subjects of portraits get credit, incredible situations get credit, architectural feats get credit, even stunning cloud formations deserve credit. Here, some credit is due the two subjects and the fact that a kid found his way into the frame. While it's great to hear the photographer's views, we can't let it define the photo or what we see. That something winds up in a photo accidentally does not make that something disposable. Street shooting is a place where accidents happen and can often make the shot. Without many of those accidents, we'd have a lot fewer compelling street shots. Same for all kinds of photos, IMO.

Fred, I almost added the essence of what you said to my own comment.  That viewers can find something in a photo that the photographer never intended or never even saw him/herself is one of the great things about photography, IMO.  I'm not a fan of the fifth eye, but that could also mean I'm not as imaginative as other viewers who can find something in the photo that appeals to them.  [Really, I'm well-aware that I'm a traditional kind of photographer with traditional photographs, but what I'm photographing and how I'm photographing are where I want to be at this point in time.]  My comments on this photo were intended to take it into a more traditional aesthetic, simply because that's what I generally prefer.  It's just my own opinion, and obviously not everyone agreed with me (in fact, I think I was in the minority).  I also had a feeling that this was not the composition that Ian originally intended, and I think I'm correct on that point, but Ian still went with it anyway rather than cropping/editing before posting, thereby leaving it open to viewers' comments.

Well Done!