The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!!! Please Critique

[theantiquetiger]

We do this every year, we go to the local produce market and take pictures in the huge mound of pumpkins

[theantiquetiger]

Couple more (I like this one of the girls the best)

[Bambi]

it's a nice set of what looks like a fun day. In all the eyes seem to be a bit soft but I think you could fix it.

IMO the best one is the second one - in the pile of pumpkins- it has great colour and tells a story for me. I like the one of the girl passing the small pumpkin but it's a bit soft and you cut off the bottom of the pumpkin and her hand.

I think you need to figure out the focal point (in this case the eyes) and really work on it.

[Mad Aussie]

What a cool little tradition you have going there! Love the halloween bows to go with the pumpkins.

I pretty much agree with Bambi's critique. I will add, for the 2nd shot, that the blown out top left section only detracts to the photo. That should be cropped out. Good composition is about what you include ... what you exclude ... and where you place the elements within the shot.

With people, and using auto focus, make sure your camera's auto focal points (usually red dots in the viewfinder) are set to one dot and then make sure that one dot is on the persons eye when you press to focus. If the eyes aren't sharp, the photo isn't good. You can see in the 3rd shot that the bows are nice and sharp but those big, beautiful blue eyes aren't. Such a cute shot that lacks due to those out of focus eyes. You can see, in photo 2 of the 2nd post, that again the focus has hit the bows perfectly, but isn't quite right on the eyes, although it is better.

[theantiquetiger]

it's a nice set of what looks like a fun day. In all the eyes seem to be a bit soft but I think you could fix it. IMO the best one is the second one - in the pile of pumpkins- it has great colour and tells a story for me. I like the one of the girl passing the small pumpkin but it's a bit soft and you cut off the bottom of the pumpkin and her hand.

I think you need to figure out the focal point (in this case the eyes) and really work on it.

I set the focal points on the eyes and the image looks much better before I uploaded to the site, so it maybe the compression of the site. I need to resize the images so the site does not compress it.

As for the first three images (they looked better in Gimp) do have a lot of flaws that I did not see earlier. The one with both girls and the mound missing on the top left, I wanted the mound to be shown like this to show the magnitude of the mound, but I do realize the background is way over exposed.

The image with Morgan holding the small pumpkin, I knew as soon as I saw it that I missed the pumpkin (it was missed in the original image, not cropped).

The bet thing I like about all these images is the richness of the color of the pumpkins.

I do like the gourd picture a lot.

[Marko]

I agree with bambi here - very nice colourful and FUN set, but seriously compromised by eye sharpness issues on shots 2-3. I also agree w/MA's blanket statement 98% of the time. (the 2% is if you expressly wanted unsharp eyes). If the eyes are soft the photo is simply flawed, move on to a new photo, or keep it only as a souvenir.

I do hope compression was the case here - Just as an FYI 275 k is PLENTY to get very sharp photos. It also helps keep people from printing the photos because all they get is mush with that filesize.
Hope that helps - Marko

[theantiquetiger]

So I need to keep them < 275kb? I've been uploading them a lot bigger than that (7-10mb), all my photos, the bees as well. I know the third picture of the first set, her eyes were marbled when viewed in Gimp.

I will re-upload this evening after I reduce the size and see what it does.

Thanks for the info

[Marko]

If you upload directly, YES they must be less than 275 K.

If you "call" the photo from Flickr or another 3rd party site they can be any size.

Personally I upload directly at about 200k or so.

[theantiquetiger]

I shrunk the images before uploading (disregard the middle picture, I accidently uploaded it and can't figure out how to delete)

[theantiquetiger]

One more. I think this came out unbelievable!!!!

[Mad Aussie]

The sharpness certainly looks better in the 1st and 3rd ones.

[theantiquetiger]

The sharpness certainly looks better in the 1st and 3rd ones.

Yeah, I didn't realize how much the site compression softens the image. The middle image was a full size image I accidently clicked on and it compressed. The other two, I resized in Gimp and then uploaded.

[Marko]

One more. I think this came out unbelievable!!!!

(I received a PM to critique the image in post 10)

Although i hate to rain on anyone's parade, I must be honest, especially when asked directly.

I do like the light, colour and overall comp, though I would have liked to have seen her full pinky finger if I'm being really critical.

That said.......the eyes are simply too soft here and therefore this image to my eye is seriously compromised and would be relegated to the souvenir pile. (Just my opinion tho).

[theantiquetiger]

I think the eyes are much better than I've been hitting on, but I just cannot get that sharpness. The over all comp of this image, I wasn't too big on it at first (that's why I didnt post it at the beginning of the thread), but after manipulating it, it has grown on me. The original was with The background in focus. I basically did a layer mask and did a g. Blur of 30 and then did another layer mask and g. Blur of 5 on her body, so just her face was clear.

[Marko]

As we get more experience, we become WAY more critical with our photography. I can see why you like the shot, it's oozing sweet cute. But let me know if you "love" the shot 6 months from now after you post shots with sharp eyes.
In terms of sharpness, Up the shutter speed next time. 1/50 is probably too slow for you.
Go to 1/125 for that focal length next time.
I rarely shoot animals of any kind at less than 1/60.
Kids can be jittery buggers and their movement OR your movement is likely adding "shake" into the shot.
Triple check the focus after the shot by zooming in on the eye. If it's not the sharpest element of the shot, reshoot it right then and there.
Hope that may help - marko

[theantiquetiger]

OK, one more, please just critique the eyes (second image). I know I missed the bow at the top and her arms look weird.

I am adding this one to compare to the second one

http://www.photography.ca/Forums/attachments/f21/13592d1317688366-great-pumpkin-charlie-brown-please-critique-morganpumpkinscompletesmall.jpg

[Mad Aussie]

Definitely a huge improvement ... you must be able to see what we mean now ... how that original was just a keepsake but these are good photos! Use the levels tool to bring up the background darker bits and you've got a damn nice photo there.

[theantiquetiger]

Definitely a huge improvement ... you must be able to see what we mean now ... how that original was just a keepsake but these are good photos! Use the levels tool to bring up the background darker bits and you've got a damn nice photo there.

Thanks! As for the background, I am still a little naive in obtaining that. I tried, but it did not come out well.

Here is the original untouched (reduced in size)