I recently stayed in a village near Shaolin temple in Henan, China. At night students at one of the wushu schools were running laps around the village and I got some good shots of them in motion, but I have two that I'm having trouble picking between. In the first image I like that the action is closer to me, but I feel like it crowds the stationary monk in the background. Anyone have a strong preference between the two?
This is one of those "you had to have been there" shots. Without the backstory it's just a bunch of burrled kids. No clues they are martial arts students or in China except for the writing on the wall at the right. That being the case my suggestion is to pick the one that resonates the most with your memories of the experience.
So while the shot of the kids works for you, cropping the kids out of it would work better for me due to the different memories it triggers.
Brings to mind an idea. The diner on the right is a distraction from the kids, the kids a distraction from the diner. To solve that problem cut the baby in half into two separate photos: A close cropped abstract blur of kids, and a diner at night resembling an iconic American painting.
Much better - might consider removing the draping line at left and bright spots in background. Also bring power poles and porch columns to vertical to remove distortion.
