A couple interesting shots

[jfelbab]

Flipper says hello.




Larry Ellison, Oracle CEO, practicing for the America's Cup race in San Francisco Bay.

[Photo-John]

Jim-
Those are both nice. And even better - there's room for improvement

The dolphin photo is pleasant, but there's nothing about it that moves it to the next level. I'm not sure what you might have done different besides shoot more and select another one. With action subjects that you can't control, sometimes that's the best technique - shoot tons and hope for something great. A tighter crop would probably help what you have here. I think there's much more blue water than necessary. We only need a hint of the water to get the idea. You should always carefully evaluate every element of an image and ask yourself how necessary it really is. In this case, the water is important, but a little bit will go a long way. No need for it to compete with the dolphin for my attention.

The Alcatraz image is nice enough, too. The crooked horizon really jumps out at me, though. There's no reason for it. Crop the image to correct for the tilt. It's an easy fix. And once again, ask yourself about each element. Specifically, how important is all that sky, and do those bits of tree add or subtract from the image. Evaluate and crop accordingly.

Hope that's useful. They're both nice, photo-worthy subjects. I think you've chosen well. You just need to think more and look harder at what you're shooting - before nd after.

[jfelbab]

Thanks for the very constructive feedback. This is exactly the type of info that I need to improve my photos. Guess I'll be needing Photoshop after all.

Funny how difficult it was to see that the SF Bay photo was not level when I framed it.

I'll re-upload these two after taking your suggestions so we can see the result.