Fire Dept Fundraiser

[A/Ox4]

Our local city fire dept raised funds for a firefighter week has suffered a stroke.

They served pancakes at fire station 1 to raise money and invited anyone and everyone everyone. The fire dept has red fire engines. The white engines is another area dept that came in support. There was even a drive thru line!

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[charchri4]

Wow these are outstanding! I love this kind of candid photography. Really well done!

 

[tirediron]

Good set.

 

[A/Ox4]

Several of these are waaaay tooo loosely cropped, allowing all the interest to drain out of them.
The color is unsaturated and the images don't look their best.

His face is dark and the rest of the room is bright.
lighten his face and arm, darken the rest
warm it up

View attachment 111193



View attachment 111194

No offense, but I really dislike your edits. The one of the guy closing a container has terrible color accuracy making him look sunburnt and the back wall look yellow.

I would rather maintain aspect ratio than crop to only the subject. What's the point of a 4:3 image?

No thank you.

 

[vintagesnaps]

You got some nice photos but some have more background than you need, which can make for having distractions in the photos. I tend to shoot pretty tight because of all the stuff around that I don't want in the frame, I want the viewer to see the subject and not all the extra stuff that would just clutter up my photos.

It takes practice and timing. For example, in the second to last one, waiting another sec. or so til the guy in the foreground moved on out of the frame, while I stepped to the left and flipped the camera into vertical position, would be my way of getting it.

#4 captured a good spontaneous moment, it would have been nice to have the name of the fire dept. but sometimes you can't catch that in time so I might crop it slightly (to eliminate chopped off lettering). The next one is real nice, but look at the sides of the photos, I'd get rid of the person's arm to the right and whatever's to the left (if it's not recognizable I think that's what can add clutter to a background, I like to get clean shots). The one handing Styrofoam boxes to the driver is nice but the woman's head needs to not be there. Same with the guy in the plaid shirt, and the half a woman and other people and tables etc. to the far left in the next couple of photos.

Try watching the sides/corners of the frame if you do more events, it takes practice with things happening fast. and tightening up and/or cropping a little. It looks like you were in some tricky or low lighting and might need to adjust exposure or do some adjusting of the color and brightness.

 

[A/Ox4]

You got some nice photos but some have more background than you need, which can make for having distractions in the photos. I tend to shoot pretty tight because of all the stuff around that I don't want in the frame, I want the viewer to see the subject and not all the extra stuff that would just clutter up my photos.

It takes practice and timing. For example, in the second to last one, waiting another sec. or so til the guy in the foreground moved on out of the frame, while I stepped to the left and flipped the camera into vertical position, would be my way of getting it.

#4 captured a good spontaneous moment, it would have been nice to have the name of the fire dept. but sometimes you can't catch that in time so I might crop it slightly (to eliminate chopped off lettering). The next one is real nice, but look at the sides of the photos, I'd get rid of the person's arm to the right and whatever's to the left (if it's not recognizable I think that's what can add clutter to a background, I like to get clean shots). The one handing Styrofoam boxes to the driver is nice but the woman's head needs to not be there. Same with the guy in the plaid shirt, and the half a woman and other people and tables etc. to the far left in the next couple of photos.

Try watching the sides/corners of the frame if you do more events, it takes practice with things happening fast. and tightening up and/or cropping a little. It looks like you were in some tricky or low lighting and might need to adjust exposure or do some adjusting of the color and brightness.

Thank you. Your criticism was much more constructive. It is something I generally try to watch out for. This was a quick edit. You're right in that I could gain a lot by small crops here or there.

Specifically with the guy in the foreground, I was pretty angry about that. My goal was to get the picture of food being passed to the passenger. After reviewing the images the only one that showed this well was with the man, unfortunately. Being that it was a documentary event I decided that would have to be okay, since its not a memorial shoot like a wedding or something.

 

[vintagesnaps]

It's always something... in sports, the guys with the cotton candy, kids running by, the mascot standing a foot in front of me (apparently thinking with a telephoto lens I could get a shot that close) - everything but the actual game. Can't always get what you want, but I found it involves a certain amount of waiting and watching and took a lot of practice to get the timing down.

 

[charchri4]

Interesting. One person says they are cropped too close and the other says not close enough. I guess I'm too easy because I never noticed most of the above. I did notice the guy in the red jacket out of focus in the foreground and would have left that one in the recycle bin. The subject was already covered 2 shots up anyway. But really all I saw in the rest of them was good people working hard, loving what they do and enjoying their guests. I immediately felt a connection to the scene as it unfolded and enjoyed the shots very much.

Now that being said after looking at them through Sharons lens I have to say she is spot on. They are great photos for sure but her suggestions would make them better. So thank you Sharon for the thoughtful and insightful look at these photos for us. I learned quite a lot in this thread!