Orange Berryby
SciurusComment by RiderGal: *Critique Club*
First off, in terms of the challenge it is very difficult to decide whether this fit or not... I did not vote in this challenge, because I felt it was much too wide open, and so I really can't say yes or no.
Good job blurring your background with the f2.8... this made for a fairly clean photo with the subject popping out at you. One of my main issues here though, is that I'm not sure there is anyone part of the subject that is completely in focus. maybe just a tad bit of the leaf that extends out, but that's it, and you have to be careful with that when using such a low fstop. Because your photo is titled orange berry... I would expect the orange berry to be the sharpest part of the photo.
I'm having difficulties getting to the main subject for quite a few reasons, that I think could have been fixed quite easily...
1) the focus issue - sometimes when you are dealing with low f-stops like 2.8 and very small subjects, auto focus just will not do... if you have the option of using manual focus... that may be helpful... if not... try very hard to keep in mind that you will have less in focus in the image.
2) The branch above your main one is quite distracting to me, it is the darkest thing in the photo, and it leads my eyes right off the page. This might have been taken care of with a simple crop.
3) also something that might have been taken care of with a crop is the fact that the branch is dead center... because of the horizontal nature of the image... it might have been cool to have this as more of a panoramic (short and wide) shot, there by also cleaning up some of the distracting elements in the image.
Color wise, it's pretty nice, although I'm wondering if it might have benefitted from being a tad darker? it looks maybe a bit washed out.
Keep playing around! Looks like a really nice tree to photograph.
-Talya
