Frank, thank you for your thorough and helpful critique. I really appreciate it, and your points are well taken. I did take a picture showing the face of the middle boy after the 1st shot, see link below. I like the other one better, but you might see it differently. The boy with the bow is my son, he's used to me taking pictures, but the other two aren't, so I sort of slunk around and grabbed these shots, and that's probably exactly why these in the end are just backyard snapshots, albeit ones that bring a smile to my face.
Again, great to hear your thoughts and suggestions, Aaron Bransky http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=2191550&size=lg >>>> (from Frank T.) Unfortunately, it's due to that angle that things sort of fall apart for me. Other than the title, it's really hard to see what the bow and arrow boy is doing. Yes, I know we can see the target, but that's really not enough of a clue for people like me <g>. I can't tell what he's up to. We also can't see anyone's face - not that that's always a bad thing, but in this case, I think that much of what's happening in the kids' minds could be reflected on their faces. I know you were trying to get all three of them in the shot, which idea has some merit, but in this case, it might have been nice to get tight into one or more of their faces, or at least much closer than you were. Even though I posted previously saying I hate it when people tell me "I would have taken the shot such-and-such a way", I'm going to come perilously close to doing just that. Next time, maybe forget about the target, and get beside the kids (like to the left of the shooter). Try to get all three of them in profile (it looks like they would have been nicely lined up for that). With a bit of moving around, you might have been able to capture much more emotion than you did. I think you saw a scene with lots of great elements, but didn't know what to do with it - that's the impression I get anyway. This isn't a bad shot, but to me (and this is just a personal opinion), you're really close to raising it from a backyard snapshot to a statement about boys and their toys. I think you wanted to, but for whatever reason didn't exactly know what to do. OTOH, you may have shots on your disk that are closer to what I'm thinking, and if so, it would be great to see them. And, again, I'm not saying what's ~bad~ about your shot, just thinking of looking at things differently if you're presented with an analagous situation in the future. Hope you don't mind the critique.<<<<<<<
