New friend

Not sure I quite caught a nice moment here whilst on holiday in St Ives. Our friend's daughter, Sophia, was having a great time on the beach and this friendly local couple came past with their dog. Sophia was intruiged. I took a few shots and this was the one that best portrayed the encounter. A 'not quite' photo? What do you think? C&C welcome.
Matt

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Matt

GX20; DA 17-70 F4; 18-55 kit; Ricoh 50mm F2; Vivitar 75-205mm F3.8

Matt, its a good picture, but everything is in focus. A shallower DOF would have been much nicer.

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"Hardening of the categories causes art disease." - W. Eugene Smith
"All the technique in the world doesn’t compensate for the inability to notice." - Elliott Erwitt

http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulyrichard/
http://paulyrichard.wordpress.com/

I agree with Paul. I like the relationship that exists between the three people in the photo a lot. However, the b/g is too detailed and distracting. You might try Gaussian blur on the buildings - though this would probably look odd, as the far beach will be sharp. I'd also try different crops - I'm not that keen on how the buildings end on the left.

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Mhuni

Flickr Mhuni

PPG Mhuni

I like the shot, bw, clarity and the occasion gives a nice feel to the shot.

great to be in the right place at the right moment.

tell it as it is shoot it as it is!

regards

albert

would like to have seen Sophie's facial expression.

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Photography is putting one’s head, one’s eye, and one’s heart on the same axis. HCB
K20D and various stuff.

The picture has lovely quality, you were fortunate to have great light. The background detail doesn't worry me too much, you could always darken it down so you just have black shapes behind the figures. I agree with Dr Mhuni about the crop on the building on the extreme left. Easy to slice a thin piece off.
david.

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Photobucket http://s799.photobucket.com/albums/yy273/Davidtrout2/
K10d x2; IstDS; DA*16-50mm; DA*50-135mm; FA 70-200mm; SMC A 50mm 1.7; Sigma 10-20mm; DA18-55mm + other Pentax lenses from my film camera days which rarely get used now. Still have an ME super and a Z1 which I can't ever see being used again.

Thank you very much for the comments. I agree with all, except perhaps the DOF. I'm not a huge fan of shallow DOF, but each to their own of course.
I wasn't going to put this in the Gallery, but I think I'll work on a new edit using some of your suggestions.

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Matt

GX20; DA 17-70 F4; 18-55 kit; Ricoh 50mm F2; Vivitar 75-205mm F3.8

I like it.

I think a slightly shallower DOF just to take the edge off the background would look great (not that it doesn't already mind).

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No longer a Pentax owner...

Thanks for all the good advice and spirited discussion guys. Anyone mind if I hang around here a bit (I have use of a Samsung badged istDL if that helps).