glenn_polin

This doesn't show up well in thumbnail, but is really beautiful in the larger image.

Stefan,

 

What is the scale of the fountain. How big is the object and area I am looking at?

There certainly is beauty here. That said, I have a hard time seeing it as one photo...my eye goes to the trees on the left and then it goes to the open sky on the right and then to the sandbar/lighter colored area on the right. I find it difficult to take in the whole image at once.

You can live a long time on the emotion here...its good medicine. The look reminds me of one of mine (not as good as yours, but the gaze...)

 

title="Get chapter two.">Adoring Gaze

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Very pleasing...those folks in the fork really make a difference!

I would be happy to have taken this portrait. I like the device of the white on the right side. It gives context to the women's portrait. She is standing with a rain hat on, most likely outside, near a post. Without the white area, we may not recognize the rain hat or be less clear what we are seeing. Ambiguity can be great, but here I think context wins out.

One photo is the girl...her portrait, in closeup, might be stunning. The age, the posture, trapped in the world between childhood and growing up. For that photo I want more girl and less roof. I want to see her face and expression as a greater part of the photo. I care she is alone somewhere, but I don't care about the roof.

 

Then there is the perspective/roof photo...an interesting study in black and white taken from a quirky angle with a figure on it. There I want the figure diminished, or stylized. That one should be B&W (I am not a big fan on B&W, but this seems to call for it) and if I couldn't get what I wanted straight out of the camera, I would process it in Photoshop to get the effect (I'm obviously not a purist).

 

Hope this helps...the fish are good for practice, but for my money, portraiture of people who aren't smiling for the camera are the most interesting thing out there.

 

It's ambiguous and not that pleasant...what is it?

Dan,

 

I like what you did with the photo, and you found something interesting to photograph among the endless lookalike beachfront condos (my folks have one).

 

To me this photo is about form, and I would have gone further (using photoshop or with traditional methods) to emphasize the form. Why not play with it a little more, posterize it, have some fun with it. The eye is not a camera -- seeing is not objective, it is interpretation.

 

 

A picture that really struck me emotionally right away. With the nicely changing background color, I wondered if it was staged in front of a background, or if manipulated. If this was posed/staged, then I would like to see just a little more of the woman's face. Also to me the tangle of feet and hands at the bottom is somehow wrong for the very bottom of the photo. I would like to see the other compositional tries at this, to see how it could be improved (slightly). Still, overall, it was a very happy moment seeing the photo.

I keep being drawn off into the empty area of the water. There is a story there, but somehow the lack of detail/light in his face and the amount of water keep me from "reading" the story.

This photo really pleases me, Paul. The way the close horse fills the frame and frames the horse and rider inside makes me smile each time I look at it. The color is great.

 

On some of your other photos, I felt a closeup would be more effective. The woman in pain, for example -- the whole right part of the photo seems wasted. But here the framing seems perfect to me.

You are doing wonderful work. I enjoyed this and the others. If I had to make one suggestion, I would have liked to see the thick black area in the background to have come down further toward the right of the photo, away from her breast and perhaps more towards her knee. There is a lot of the black in the upper left, and the upper right quadrant isn't as connected to the rest of the photo as I would like.

I don't know why but the photo makes me very happy. Many of your nudes are beautiful, but this one is somehow full and lush and at the same time understated. The face draws me in and I slide down the shoulder and find the breast. The curvature of the breast at the bottom right is wonderful.

I don't feel the despair -- there is too much light for despair. Also the form of the person is not transmitting despair. Still the composition is mostly pleasing, the image interesing.