April 2009 - Admin's choice - Image of the month

**Marko** · 05-07-2009 01:12 PM

Hi members,

This is a relatively new suggestion from a thread by Mad Aussie
where the Admin (me) chooses one excellent photo each month from the Show forum, the critique forum and the assignment forum to talk about and suggest why it is good as a learning tool.

I have spent several hours (4-5 hours) going through every single thread from April 2009 from the Show forums, the assignment forums and the critique forum....and it's getting harder and harder to choose one image. Also it's really hard to choose 1 image from many totally different genres and so I'm likely to ask for opinions in another thread and change the way this is done.

This month the winner is from Siejones from this thread A zoo more...

This shot works on many levels and that's why I choose it. The eye is tack sharp and so we feel connected with the penguin. The composition is awesome here and the second bird at top left really adds to this image. The exposure is very well done and so is the lighting. I'm guessing the lighting was mixed in this environment and so it wasn't the easiest to control. There are zero distractions in this image as well.

Although normally this is an honourary award, for this month fellow member Michaelaw has graciously given me some software to offer as a prize so a double congrats to Siejones for winning a copy of Photo Album 7 by Corel. Please note this is a PC only program so let me know if you want it. This prize was offered to last month's winner but they work on a Mac.

Since we all have opinions, some members may disagree with my choice. That's cool but THIS thread is not the place for debate over my pick, NOR is it the place to further critique the image. The purpose here is to suggest strong elements in the photo that we may learn from.

I think I will add a 3-6 honourable mentions as there were also another bunch of shots that came soooo close. I'll likely post them in the blog but add a link to them in this thread.

Congrats again Siejones for creating this beautiful image.