A new one for ripping apart!

[jterry85]

I'm deployed to afghanistan and for the past 8 months have not been able to actually use my camera and practice photography other than my 2 weeks of leave I got. So... I read the forums, blogs and websites and look at other people's stuff. I also have a gear buying issue... As in I see cool things, I buy cool things, this problem will go away when I finally get back home and my extra deployment money runs out. It's incredibly easy for me to convince myself that I need new stuff...

 

[Compaq]

Holy cow... All that stuff will not help you're learning, I'll tell you that much. Seriously. You'll never outgrow most of them. You've spent a small fortune!

 

[bazooka]

I agree with Compaq's prognosis. There isn't any "story" or "catch" here, no clever composition. The lady walking by COULD be used effectively, but I never realized she was there until you mentioned it. Her shirt perfectly matches the color of the gate and she's halfway covered by the guard rail. It's great to use a person as a hidden part of the image to show the enormity of something, but the eye should eventually be led to her. Here it does not. My eye jumps between the towers and the shadow and the water and I accept that's all there is. Now that I see her, she actually makes the tower look smaller than I initially thought it was.

And as was also mentioned, the light direction is quite flat giving little feeling of depth and detail. Perhaps you could have waited a bit for the sun to go down or be blocked by some buildings.

 

[Diver_matt]

I'm wondering now, based on what you said, if having some of the other blgs (or part of them) wouldn't have helped. Perhaps provide more scale and contrast of time.

 

[jterry85]

Compaq- I 100% do NOT expect the gear to help me learn or just "give" me a good photograph, I understand that happens around here from time to time. I bought most of it because after seeing other peoples, well... quite frankly I wanted to play with em, lol. As for the money, it is quite a bit however my wife and I don't really spend any money except on the few things we love. Photography is something she is interested in as well although not as much as me.

Bazooka- Thanks for the C&C

Diver_matt- I don't have all of the originals with me although I'll see if my wife can email me some so I can show a different perspective. As I had just started when I took the photograph I assumed the most impressive photo would be one in which the subject dominates the photo, I am now realizing that this is not ALWAYS the case.