Weekly Competition #267 - Holiday Time Competition

Not so many entries as last week - perhaps some are away for the bank holiday.


bforbes - St. Ives Beach
This reminds me of one of those well received seascapes of contrasting horizontal bands of colour. This certainly has those. My feeling is that if you took out everything above and including the distant shore line it would concentrate the subject as presently I seem to drift off (almost literally) over the sea to try and work out where it was taken when clearly the subject is the two silhouetted people walking the dog. Removing the top would then place the figures and dog on the top right hand intersecting thirds and I believe strengthen the image. I don't think letterboxing it even more would be an issue either. I can only judge it as it is and it is so nearly there; a well seen scene!


timcx500e - Whitby Beach
An amusing picture with just the one deckchair on an another otherwise almost deserted beach. It's hard to believe the timestamp: 2012-08-06 15:11:58. Three o'clock on an August afternoon, you'd expect the beach to be packed! With its classic composition and S-curve water line it almost looks like a photograph taken especially for the competition. Very good.


dannyh - Holiday "triptych"
Technically very well photographed. The water looks like water and I like the reflection; sort of makes you want to go and join in for a paddle too! Regarding the composition of the photograph I feel that perhaps 'triptych' himself is too central, a crop off the left side and another crop off the top would strengthen it quite a lot. Certainly a great photo for the family album and notwithstanding, a contender for the competition.


johnriley - On The Beach
It looks a very uncomfortable beach to sit on! I like the photograph as it tells a story - a cycle ride down to the beach to watch the sea - and that story isn't being overly confused by unwanted objects in the picture other than that fishing person (lower down) who could probably have been hidden by moving just a foot or so to the right causing him to become hidden behind the subject figure. The photograph certainly fits the competition theme very well.


japers45 - Solitary Holiday
This is quite a well composed photograph and looks like it might have been tricky to get the exposure right (which I feel you have managed to do quite well to avoid burning out all the white areas.) Must say well done to Bexhill for having it all so clean looking and no litter. The solitary figure does look so odd in all that sunshine and one wonders where everyone else is.


VonBatCat - Sun, Sea and Photography
A good attempt at something different. This photograph has the look of a professional model agency shoot. If the staging of the photograph was under your control, I think I would have had the model less central, facing the other way about and placed on the right hand third to balance the position of the sun. Alternatively, move the camera so the sun is on the right side so that the figure appears to be looking at it. This very nearly comes off but feel this particular image just misses the mark for to me it's unbalanced. I would have thought that in May the sun would have been higher than that at 3pm in the afternoon so wonder if this might be two images superimposed, also the slightly elliptical shape of the sun adds to that thought? Just to add there is nothing wrong in doing that! I also appreciate you may not have changed the camera time for your exotic holiday location so the time stamp could be incorrect for where you were.


tyronet2000 - School Holidays
A really summery holiday scene at a tourist destination and fits the competition theme well. What I am not sure about is what the subject of the photograph is. Is it the family walking into frame, the potted plants, or the fountain display? Someone's pointing, but what at? I feel a square format image, cutting off the right hand potted plant makes the pointing figure look like they may now be looking at the fountains and this causes the family to take up a stronger place in the frame and balance the water feature. If you don't like the square format you'd end up with, crop out some or even all of the sky too.


stephanie0812 - donkeys
It's nice to have your photograph of the donkeys included as they are indeed part of the typical British summer holiday. And one element that's less common than it used to be. It actually could be quite a good picture as I will show but for some reason this particular image as entered is let down by some rather drab colours, indeed to me it looks to be verging on monochrome. Perhaps it was the weather. It needs perking up a bit!
I was wondering if the desaturation was deliberate for some reason or the camera settings got accidentally nudged or your own monitor is set exceptionally vivid. Was this done to dull down that bright yellow wind break? If so, just select that section and desaturate that. Personally I cannot see any advantage in having such drab colours for a photograph such as this. I think I'd certainly crop off the small section of donkey on the right hand edge and even the lady with the carrier bags, however try and keep in the donkey's ears of both your main subjects.
I've had a little go with it and found turning up the colour/saturation in elements to about +77 brings it back to life! The sand on the beach also reverts to yellow and the donkeys get their colour back. I've cropped it as suggested (though I couldn't put back the cropped off ears) and then desaturated just the windbreak back to about where you had it. My tweaking can be viewed at here (for the time being) to show what I mean.
Let me know if you object to that and I'll delete it forthwith!


geordie01 - Back from the beach
That's a clever picture and it's good the way the clutter leads up to the door! Technically it's very good but I find the tourist board sign detracts immensely and it doesn't really need to be there. Anything with writing on draws one's attention and that isn't what this image is about. Just crop it off or clone it out and it might well have been the winner!


kosh - On the Beach
I like the way the subject has been isolated. The picture tells a clear story of the youngster rushing down to the sea for some surfing or body boarding. I do feel though that the use of the long telephoto lens here has made the subject look somewhat remote. There is the potential for a winning shot here with the idea and subject, but don't think this is it. You might need to go down on the beach too and capture some water splashes as she enters the sea.


paulb531 - Fairground attraction
Good exposure and colour. This is a really good record shot of the attraction but perhaps not the best for a competition entry. Somehow the attraction seems to merge into the background, a wider aperture to throw the background out of focus or a different angle may have helped. I wondered what aperture you had used to try and help; the exif shows f-Stop:f/8 and Aperture Value f/6 so I'm non the wiser, in fact more confused than ever! The crane thing behind catches one's eye too and leads you away the subject. Just a close up of part of the ride may have given you a stronger photograph for the competition. There's plenty of colour there too to make the photo really stand out.


Frankie - Here Come The Tourists
Certainly a photograph that fits the theme well and is well photographed. I've never experienced a cruise on one of those myself, not sure I really want to! As a picture it is an excellent record shot of the ship. I see nothing really wrong with the photograph either technically or compositionally but somehow it just doesn't inspire me to say, 'Wow!' which is what one would expect of a competition winner.


ArsenAl - Towers of Old Tallinn
A terrific evocative sunset/silhouette. Well captured; good choice of lens; spot on exposure; sharp; a well balanced image carefully cropped. Well done. A photograph to be proud to take home from your holiday.


peterm23 - Southwold
Lovely atmospheric shot and I can see why you have chosen this one to enter. I like the way the light is cascading down over the lighthouse. I'm not altogether sure what the main subject of the picture is but as an overall view it is quite pleasing. I think it is the effect of the backlighting that makes it sort of 3D.


Some really good entries that really stood out, albeit several needed a bit of cropping perhaps. Others were more of a record shot variety. Nothing wrong in taking those but often these do not stand up well in competitions. One has to think of special photos as well as the record shots. It is always worth looking at the overall composition of the photograph. ArsenAl made sure he only had the essential elements included in the picture before hitting the upload button. Quite a few of the entries here could have benefited from a similar treatment. So for me there was no doubt over what should be the first placed entry this time:


1st: ArsenAl - Towers of Old Tallinn
2nd: japers45 - Solitary Holiday
3rd= peterm23 - Southwold
3rd= johnriley - On The Beach

HC geordie01 - Back from the beach
HC dannyh - Holiday "triptych"


Many thanks to you all who took the time to enter, it was great to see your entries, and it's over to ArsenAl for the week to come. You'll be needing a well framed image to impress!

John

Thanks for the Competition and the detailed judging John, I'll give your suggestion a try. It's a shame you did not have more entries for what I thought was a very open subject. Congratulations to all those selected

Congratulations to the Winner, runners up and the hc's. Thanks John for the subject and the constructive comments.

Congratulations to the winners , i think most people visit Whitby for the shops and the abbey , regards, tim.

Congrats to the winners and thanks for the HC. I know what you mean about the sign in the photo but decided to leave it in to show the holiday element.

Thanks for the comp John and congratulations to the winners. I know what you mean about not having any WOW factor. Still, since I only took up photography to improve my holiday snaps I'm getting there slowly. (very slowly)

Thankyou for my second place- one of the problems I had was choosing the photo as I had been in Bexhill all week taking loads of shots. Glad i chose this one now

Congrats to winner, places HC's et al. I didn't enter the comp but have enjoyed looking at the shots and reading the very good judging/comments by JAK

congratulations to the winner, a beautiful capture. Thanks John for your comments on my donkeys. To answer your question, i monochromed the picture deliberately and then added subtle colour to just the donkeys. It felt a little more 'retro' to me, I wanted to convey a traditional, old-fashioned feel. But I take your point and I like your technicolour edit of my photo. Again, I learn something from a more experienced Pentax user and your topic brought out some joyful images.

Wouldn't a full sepia effect have done that better? The washed out colours just looked wrong to me though in the original full colour version that yellow wind break stood out too much.
Another option might have been to try a grunge filter effect to make it look old; there was a thread here on how to do it and a competition for that a little while ago.

John

John

Thank you JAK!!! congratulations to other winners and HC's!