Some candids from Westside Nutt Club's Fall Festival, Evansville, IN. This single activity is the annual fundraiser for all charitable, service, and volunteer organizations in the Evansville area.
Not necessarily within my comfort zone - strangers, people and all that.
These are fun!
In the first, seems like she should be showing off a ring, but I suppose its an odd, playful gesture. I love the girls expression as she watches. I think I'd crop some from the top. Not so much that you cut the head of the woman on the right, although she only adds a candid feel and does help with a diagonal to the main subject. But I dont think the height of the image helps and Bus Stop sign might not be needed.
I REALLY like the second. Cant help but chuckle at the Rib Eye sign that almost seems pointing to her. This is a classic image!
Third doesnt work for me, either calorically (a word?) or aesthetically. The toning just seems wrong. The concept is delicious!
Hard working, playing mid-west folks. Many live in rural communities and farm. Others have migrated to factory work, however that work is gradually going elsewhere, Mexico or off-shore.
This portion of the Ohio River valley is dotted with pharmaceutical and chemical plants so ironically there is an abundance of highly educated engineers and chemical/petrochemical researchers.
About as conservative "Americana" as you will find. Ethnically descendants of middle and east European plus Scandinavian.
I assume daughter - that day the kids rides all opened at noon, area school holiday. Lots and lots of strollers, pre-k, and elementary school kids running around.
The first shot works better for me cropped in tighter on just the two foreground figures because the sign and and scene on the left in the background are distractions and the woman in the background isn't flattered much by the photo due to her expression. I also made a middle slider correction in Levels to pull up the shaded faces...
In the second shot all the space above her does add much because its mostly blank wall. The same subject from the second set works better because of the direct angle and the posters on top creating composition balance and context.
The third shot would have been better if a bit wider without the chips chopped by the crop on top.
In the shot of the bikes in (last shot) I'd suggest a tighter crop. In the original the content in the background and foreground are more or less in balance creating a ping-pong situation of competing centers of interest. A tighter crop shifts the emphasis to the more interesting foreground for me..
My eye wanders back to the couple in the background, but then having nowhere else to the right to look I get pulled back for another look at the foreground. That dynamic works because the parallax put the couple behind very close horizontally to the couple on the bike.
I'm reading a book on composition; reactive photography is one of the categories discussed vis-a-vis planned, or otherwise non-spontaneous photography; street photography and photojournalism being the two primary categories.
Interestingly the author identifies photojournalism as the most difficult given the number of diverse components that must come together for one instant to produce an effective image, which may not one necessarily be deemed so by the art community - two different worlds and mental constructs derived from a single source. There is enough room for everybody
