Shot with soft focus effect by shooting through a plastic baggie... I know the soft focus will get slammed by the voting public, but wish this wasn't a given...
Ron, I am so glad you pointed out that you don't mind negative comments. I was soooooo biting my tongue during the challenge on this photo, but now I can let loose:
The reason is would have loved to comment at all, is because of the potential I saw in a photo that had gone wrong.
There are times where a soft focus effect works well, and this could be one of those times. However, the WAY you did it - didn't work. Perhaps a proper soft focus filter would have helped for that. At the very least, I think you should have left the trees soft, but brought some sharpness back into gazebo.
It just doesn't look right, the purple fringing around the sky is very distracting, and the rest of it just looks somewhat off focus rather than soft.
It is not the most exciting scene out (but I still think it is pretty) and the lighting is dreadfully dull. Very early morning or late afternoon light would have made that part more interesting.
How about adding a point of interest to look at - perhaps a large windchime of some natural type design that would fit into the scene - strategically placing it so it catches the sun with a little sparkle.
(oh and make a fairy flutter around while you're at it *g*).
I think you found a very pretty spot and you were trying to do the right thing with it. I hope you can go back to that same place and try again.
since you asked for contructive (read - you know what) comments...
the soft focus effect doesnt really work here. First the effect isnt properly executed and rather than a "mystic" glow you have an OOF image, plus the overexposed top right corner isnt helping either.
However the bigger problem, at least imo, is that the picture is plain boring. A few trees and a outdoor resting place thingy (forgot what its called) shot straight on. Even the best filter in the world couldnt rescue the lacking artistic value of this shot. You should have tried various angles, maybe further back to make this more of a landscape or closer to the ground to give a different viewpoint with blades of green grass in sharp focus in the foreground, maybe having the house frame the trees or having a reflection if there was a stream behind the house.
Your framing could be better. Gazebo is the title, but a good portion of it is hidden behind a tree, and there is too much of the tree behind it in the frame, and the light in the top right does not need to be in the frame either. True, it is your artistic expression, but I would ask: what does the tree behind it add to the shot? what does the light source at the top right add to the shot? If the answers are nothing, then take them out, or work them into the frame differently.
I like shots like this, but this one needs some work, imo. First, it appears to be OOF. Also, I think you could have cropped out the tree in the lower right hand corner, which would also eliminate the blown out, detail-less sky.
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