Before you critique a photograph:
Some things that you may want to consider:
Effort:
Has the photographer made full use of the facilities at his disposal? Or, are
there things that the photographer could have improved with a little more work?
Does it look like the photographer made an extra effort to capture the best
possible image under the circumstances, or did he just go with what was in front
of him?
Color: Was the
photographer's choice to use or not use color sound? If the photographer used
black and white, then is the subject of the photo something that is normally
associated with color, like an apple? If the photographer used color, does the
color add to or detract from the image?
Spatial positioning and composition:
Is the subject in the center of the frame? Usually a centered subject looks
boring, but it works in some cases. Did it work this time? Does anything look
squeezed up against the side of the frame? Are there big open spaces around
the edges that could be cropped out? Is there a clear subject that occupies
the majority of the frame, or is the subject unclear or small and surrounded
by irrelevant material?
Direction of attention:
What do you see first in the photo? Is it the right thing? Do you have to hunt
for the subject or does it stand out? Is your eye drawn to objects in the background,
rather than the subject, or do you look to the edge of the frame, expecting
to find something that isn't there?
Focus: Is anything
in focus? Is it the subject or something else? Is the depth of field appropriate?
Is the subject contained within the depth of field or are parts of the subject
fuzzy? Are there distracting elements in the background that are in focus which
would have been blurred out by a wider aperture?
Exposure: Is
the photo properly exposed? Are there details both in the highlights and in
the shadows, or are there large "blown-out" highlight areas or "blocked-up"
shadow areas? If the exposure is biased towards light (high key) or dark (low
key), did the photographer make a good choice?