New guy, some of my first shots

[cigrainger]

These are from my first two rolls with an SLR ever. Let me know what you think!

1.

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4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

 

[WNK]

Cool series! There's really too many to comment on each on individually, but I do really like the fifth one down with the skyline. Very neat -- keep up the good shooting!

 

[LaFoto]

Nice series, you are doing well with your new SLR! Congratulations!
And you happen to live in one of the most photogenic towns there ever can be, so your photo opportunities are about ENDLESS! Cool.

A pity that you cropped off large parts of the castle, I think the turrets and towers and roofs are important, so that is my major critique about your first photo here (No. 1 ... I numbered them for you, it is advisable to number one's photos once a series placed into one thread gets larger than about 3 - 4 pics).

#2 is ... well, erm ... just a photo... there is not much there.

#3 is too centred for my liking, i.e. your main subject is in the square centre of your image, which often produces a bit of a boring picture, and while "The Rule of Thirds" is a rule that can well be broken, it often helps to watch it a little to enhance the first impression of whichever kind of image (photo, drawing, painting).

In #4, Calton Hill competes with the monuments of the cemetery at its bottom (whose name I unfortunately forgot

), so it would be wise to focus on on or the other (compositionally).

In Photo 5 you have the problem of centering your main subject again, the horizon line divides the photo into two clear halves: top half non-descript sky, bottom half townscape, clock tower in the dead centre. With regards to composition this is unadvisable, so next time you climb up onto Calton Hill, move the camera further down, get more city into your frame and less sky, and move the clock tower off centre (or crop this one in a post processing session within your computer - or actively take the scissors to your print, for that matter).

Photo 6: centered subject. The idea of including the path is good, but the path leads the eye right out of the frame and not towards your subject. And you must consider the fact that if you include a lot of fairly bright, all overcast sky into your frame, your camera will have a hard time exposing right for the darker parts (which are the more important here), it will always try to expose right for all, but the dynamic range is too large and some parts will therefore get too dark.

Now the colour photos are all ever so much better. How is that possible?
Different camera?
I do like DOF in the first of the three colour photo and the element of vanishing point in the last.
Did you take these, too?

 

[cigrainger]

Nice series, you are doing well with your new SLR! Congratulations!
And you happen to live in one of the most photogenic towns there ever can be, so your photo opportunities are about ENDLESS! Cool.

A pity that you cropped off large parts of the castle, I think the turrets and towers and roofs are important, so that is my major critique about your first photo here (No. 1 ... I numbered them for you, it is advisable to number one's photos once a series placed into one thread gets larger than about 3 - 4 pics).

#2 is ... well, erm ... just a photo... there is not much there.

#3 is too centred for my liking, i.e. your main subject is in the square centre of your image, which often produces a bit of a boring picture, and while "The Rule of Thirds" is a rule that can well be broken, it often helps to watch it a little to enhance the first impression of whichever kind of image (photo, drawing, painting).

In #4, Calton Hill competes with the monuments of the cemetery at its bottom (whose name I unfortunately forgot

), so it would be wise to focus on on or the other (compositionally).

In Photo 5 you have the problem of centering your main subject again, the horizon line divides the photo into two clear halves: top half non-descript sky, bottom half townscape, clock tower in the dead centre. With regards to composition this is unadvisable, so next time you climb up onto Calton Hill, move the camera further down, get more city into your frame and less sky, and move the clock tower off centre (or crop this one in a post processing session within your computer - or actively take the scissors to your print, for that matter).

Photo 6: centered subject. The idea of including the path is good, but the path leads the eye right out of the frame and not towards your subject. And you must consider the fact that if you include a lot of fairly bright, all overcast sky into your frame, your camera will have a hard time exposing right for the darker parts (which are the more important here), it will always try to expose right for all, but the dynamic range is too large and some parts will therefore get too dark.

Now the colour photos are all ever so much better. How is that possible?
Different camera?
I do like DOF in the first of the three colour photo and the element of vanishing point in the last.
Did you take these, too?

Thanks a ton . Yep, I took the color ones as well, and they were the same camera with the same lens. That was my second roll of film on an SLR ever, whereas the b/w were my first. I actually got most of the criticism you gave me on those first ones (especially about the rule of thirds) from friends, and then went out and applied it on my second roll. Just letting you know, that first picture isn't castle but St. Leonard's hall at Pollock Halls, the university housing at which I'm staying!

I really appreciate the criticism though, there's some stuff in there, like about the path leading away from the subject, that I hadn't heard before, and I will definitely take into account when I'm composing my photos next. I'm going to have some shots I took of St. Andrews on Friday up today that I think will be infinitely better than these or my zoo photos, because I read up on a bunch of stuff, and read the class on http://www.morguefile.com/archive/classroom.php.

Take care, I appreciate the criticism -- I really am trying to soak in every little bit of information that I can!