Waldo at Bryce Canyonby
deronComment: Greetings from the Critique Club!
The first thing I notice about this image is its crispness- having a good camera surely helped a great deal here. Technically speaking, this looks like a really difficult shot- you know probably better than I do how difficult it is to take a good picture of a snowy scene in bright sunlight.
Part of what makes this image good, especially for the challenge, is that in addition to having strong composition, the lines of the fenced pathway lead right to the Waldo, who is nonetheless well disguised in the scenery. It also has the benefit of looking less posed than many of the entries for this challenge, which in my opinion is always a positive thing. Being there in the right place at the right time is, I think, more impressive than forcing a scene and then taking a picture of it.
The only real criticism I have is the sky, which is more washed out than I'd like. The shadows on the snow are a beautiful color, and if you'd taken a shorter exposure, they would surely have been darker, so maybe you did the best that you could given the circumstances. In your place, if I had the presence of mind to do so, I think I'd have taken shadow color over sky detail too. And, since this was a basic editing challenge, you couldn't burn in the sky.
All in all, a great picture, well deserving of its 15th place finish. And considering that it's your first entry, well, all the more impressive!
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