Editor Critiques Your Photos

Editor Critique

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Taken on a bright summer evening at San Luis Obispo, this photo of a natural rock formation arch creeping into the waves sports unique colors and an almost faux film-like atmosphere. With one look I can guess this was taken with a phone, one because its natural aspect ratio is similar to a smartphone, and the photo was taken vertically. Furthermore, in brighter environments such as this, phones tend to increase its shutter speed, evident with the still yet moving water at the bottom right of the composition. On the topic of composition, this Pismo Beach scene is well-composed, leaving more visual weight at the bottom as that’s how we would naturally perceive gravity. Lots of blue sky is shown in the top two-thirds, and the bottom two thirds contains the ocean and beach. This is disrupted in a good way, however, by the rock arch formation on the left half of the composition, allowing for some dynamic movement through the picture. Two things stand out as fixes, where in looking at the ocean-sky horizon line, the picture is crooked. The second thing is the tree on top of the rock formation is just slightly touching the edge of the frame, where it would have been better if there was a margin as to not disrupt what the tree looks like. Overall, this is an excellent image, just with a few tweaks here and there. Thanks for your submission!

iPhone 8+, 1/3240s @ F1.8, ISO 50.

Pismo Beach by Alyssa Irvine, July 2022