Redhead
by garfield

Comment by Yo_Spiff:
Congrats on your first ribbon! Well, yes, it's the brown, but that is still an (arguable) achievement around here. No place to go but up, right?

Redhead
by garfield

Comment by MaryO:
Ooh, a Pileated! I love seeing those guys. Looks like this one was far away (typical) and you had to crop a lot ... ended up kind of speckly.

Redhead
by garfield

Comment by Yo_Spiff:
Sorry, but this is not coming off very well for me. Heavy backlighting, a very soft appearance, and and off looking splotchy pattern on the tree are the main issues. To be fair, birds are difficult subjects and I don't have many good bird shots of my own.

Hot N Cold
by garfield

Comment by Nuzzer:
Greetings from the Critique Club.

First impressions are "oh, some old chilli peppers".

Technically this is ok. Composition is good with the stalk being a good line to lead our eye along the chillis. The background is not distracting. DOF seems to be used well.

Artistically is where this shot falls down. The snow background is not isolated from the subject much so we find ourselves looking at that a lot. The chillis lack a certain something to make us go "wow, cool" - maybe it's the lack of "pop" in colour as one commenter suggested but maybe it's that they are dead but the overall shot doesn't show us the drama and emotion to go with that. Perhaps if you could have got a different background or some dramatic lighting/processing?

In summary an ok shot that wasn't far off a 5. Some good elements to build on for future entries. BTW, congrats on your first entry - learn and you'll be improving soon!

Feel free to PM me if you have any queries.
Gerry

Hot N Cold
by garfield

Comment by HarveyG:
Nice title but image lacks a little punch.

Redhead
by garfield

Comment by dswann:
Nice shot. Would be really good if the focus were better and the shadows opened up a bit.

Hot N Cold
by garfield

Comment by EL-ROI:
Very good subject. The shot is well composed. It does suffer from being somewhat gray. There isn't much luminescense to the shot meaning the red color does not realy pop.