A different kind of street
by Kelli

Comment:
That looks like such a fun parade! The costumes are fantastic. You captured the vivid colors well. Those bright colors are so easily over exposed.

It looks like you were in a shaded area, so my suggestion for next time might be to bump up your ISO a bit so that you can use a faster shutter speed. Paraders do a lot of waving and their costumes generally have a lot of moving pieces. I think that movement blur really had a negative impact on the shot.

Composition wise, it's a candid so several rules are often forgivable, but there's still the basics to keep in mind to make the image powerful. If you look at your rule of thirds you have the tail end of a car and the subject's wave, your subject, and then the next row of paraders. The tail end of the car cheapens the shot. I know, I know.. cars are big part of parades, but I find it distracting for this shot. It takes away from the parader's wave, which should be the main action of the shot.

I think your final score may have been lower than if you had entered this into more of a themed challenge. Freestudies are tough.

thing of beauty, joy forever
by zxaar

Comment:
This is absolutely beautiful. Your exposure is dead on.

"Unfortunately this shot is very cliche and nothing special. But it is Taj so it is in." You're insane! You've captured the sheer power and delicacy of an amazing piece of architecture. It's not easy to do what you've done here. Don't short sell yourself.

Spying on Crows
by Rebecca

Comment:
This would make a good desktop wallpaper, heh. Very cute!

The Lilly
by Rasai

Comment:
I really like your lighting, both in the foreground and background. You've captured the colors and softness of the lily nicely. I do notice quite a bit of grain in your background. Nothing a run through Neat Image or similar wouldn't fix.

One thing I struggled with shooting Calla Lilies was composition. It's like photographing a person. If you crop at a joint it looks awkward. Something about your composition here makes it feel like it was clipped at a joint. I think anything without the stem looks unnatural. I took a ton of shots and what I ended up posting still didn't seem right, heh.

I read through a couple of the other comments, and I have to agree with there being too much dead space. I cropped a big chunk of it out in Photoshop, and can't say I missed what was cropped out. The minimalism type feel and contrast was still there.

Silenced
by lovethelight

Comment:
Why am I sucker for this stuff?? This is a very powerful image. I said "wow" right off the bat. I love the flower exploding from her mouth.

Stuctures in Mist
by Sanjuro

Comment:
The textures and color of this photo just screams H.R. Giger to me. I don't know if "creepy" was the look you were going for, but it is definitely creepy. I love it, heh.

Fairy Falls (not HDR)
by ben4345

Comment:
Very, very pretty. It almost has a dark, Lord of the Rings feel. I think I would have liked to see a bit more saturation in the greens and reds. It's still very beautiful though.

It's amazing that you captured the bridge with no people on it. Every time I've been to Multnomah Falls, it's been packed. Especially with all the rain we've been getting and the obvious size of the falls this year. Maybe all the tourists were too wussy for all the rain... or maybe you just cloned them out, heh.

DSC_0445
by ryand

Comment:
I like that there appears to be steam coming off the roof of the building. Typically cloudless shots are pretty boring. The clouds in this shot add a little extra something for the viewer to look at. That touch of interest may have scored you better with this shot vs the one you entered in the challenge.

Quick Cat Portrait
by timfythetoo

Comment:
Such a beautiful cat! Great choice of props too. The paint flecks on the chair really add to the interest of the whole. The lighting and depth of field are absolutely perfect.

My one nit-pick would be the saturation of the red. In the thumbnail the red thing on the collar glows, so when you open the photo that's the first thing you notice. After that I noticed that the kitty's nose looked like it had blood on it. Without blood dripping from the jowls, I don't think blood on the nose fits your intent, heh.

For DPC, I'd tone down the red on both the nose and the collar thing. For a home family photo I'd just tone down the red on the nose a tiny bit, since the thing on the collar is probably something the family associates with the kitty.

Family Force 5
by she_is

Comment:
That's the most intense tambourining I've ever seen!

I think this is perfectly captured. The depth is great. I like that you can see just the teeth. If the whole face was visible, I'd wonder who it was. Since it's not visible I focus on just the intensity.