slow deathby
GilesComment by sidpixel: *Hello from Sid and the Critique Club*
A flower study that partially meets the challenge.
Your commendable attempt to portray death meets the challenge in as much as the decay of the dying flower head itself conveys a feeling of the final stages of the flower's life. However, completely counter to that is the effect that the lighting is having on the front petals, it has rejuvenated and breathed a new life into them making them look much fresher than is desirable for your purposes.
I think you would have been a lot more successful to have done this in its natural environment with natural light only, perhaps using reflectors if needed. In situ this would have probably given you opportunity to repeat the theme with other decaying debris in soft focus and thus convey the feeling much more successfully. Equally, where this also fails is that the focus is on those front parts of the flower where it looks freshest, I think if your focus had been on the most withered petals with the front in soft focus that would have moved the emphasis from the freshest to the deadest parts of the flower and may well have been a lot more successful.
I'm very pleased to see that you have received several comments offering some constructive critique, (I only ever look at the comments after making my own) much of which seems to concur with the points I have raised and offers more observation that I didn't. I hope our collective efforts help, thanks for submitting, Sid
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