They're wonderful and the b&w is perfect.
Love the Creative Father's pix too !

Thank you all for your very helpful comments .

I have mostly cropped to suit what I wanted, i.e. part of horse and rider. But sometimes I've left the whole horse and rider in, with far less impact, but I thought that sometimes I should try to show the whole thing. I must admit that I sometimes do a close crop because it's the best part of the shot!!

Reading these posts shows me that perhaps I was losing sight of who I'm trying to please ....

They're beautiful and you've picked up some lovely detail in all of them. I particularly like No. 2 - soft colours and a hint of something interesting on the left hand side.

My eye was drawn straight to the icon and as you'd said the weather/light was difficult, I took the shot as it was. The dark stone makes a nice frame for the strong but not harsh colours of the icon.
I like the greenery (maize?) which gives me the feeling that this icon is at the side of a country road for travellers to stop at.

Oh yes, practice is certainly what it's about - I hate to think how many wasted shots I've had, despite trying to be selective.

That makes sense, but I've still to get that right for my action shots - sometimes you have to 'set up' just ahead of the moment you want to capture. Continuous shooting doesn't always work - I've had a glitch from time to time when the shutter pauses for a nano second after the first click before continuing. I'm happy to say that the Nikon pros say they get that from time to time.

I agree with you completely, David.
Unfortunately a lot of what is posted on this forum is far too technical for me as I have trouble understanding all the terminology (yes, I know, use a dictionary ...). So there's not much I feel I can contribute to and I sometimes feel guilty if I ask for help yet have nothing to give in return.

My interest in photography continues to increase, as do the frustrations of not always feeling I'm progressing! Whilst it's nice to come on here and see what's going on, I avoid discussions on how this forum is run. Anyone who is or has been a mod/admin will know that it can be a thankless task.

I've been fortunate in knowing people at competitions round here though sometimes you don't need to go outside the public area. I find cross country events can be difficult with the 70-200 as the obstacles are really spread apart and it's not easy to be in range of more than a couple at a time, even being out on the course. The pros with their 400s get more of a selection ..... but having felt the weight of one, it's too darned heavy ! The combination of the K3, 70-200 and monopod are all I can manage (feeble woman :cry

Are there any particular rules of thumb on this ? Or is it something that depends entirely on the subject matter in the shot, and how the photographer wants to present it ?
I quite often use a square crop because that's how my subjects seem to fit best, but I don't see many other using it.

Are there proportions that are more pleasing than others ? When cropping, I stick to the original proportions - but are they the same everywhere ??

I'm not particularly keen on "letterbox" type crops - but that's just me and my screen size.

Yes, she seems to have an eye for the subject - nice to see promising young talent !