Moo Cow

I like the composition of this one, hoping you like this shot too



As always, any thoughts welcome.

My first impression is that the composition may have worked better in portrait orientation rather than landscape. I don't know if you cropped the original to get here but my eye keeps being dragged to the right of the cow's face. Working with the posted original:

I haven't cropped it at all, only had auto fix and a border. I thought the composition was good due to 'rule of thirds', I thought you weren't supposed to do pure central, or is that depending? I'm confused now, can you expand on it please? Liking your crop by the way

In my edit your eyes are drawn to the cows eyes which lie in the upper third. The rule of thirds doesn't always apply to every photo. If an area outside the main subject, ie. the cow, is distracting then your attention is drawn from the main subject. The brightly colored trees to the rear & right of the cow's face are just sharp enough and brightly colored to distract.

When you compose a subject shoot both in landscape and portrait modes ans allow enough area around the point of interest to crop if you can. Had you sgot the cow photo at a lower f-stop, say 2.8 or 3.5 your background would have faded to a soft blur and thus being less distracting. Notice I darkened the leaves above the cow's head to lessen their importance.

I like it BG not keen on the crop sorry Bob.

He is gorgeous! and I prefer the original, if I was going to crop it at all, I'd loose a bit of the trees at the top.

I agree - while Bob's edit can work on occasion (in this instance, having shot quite a lot of cattle here - I would go for a much closer crop of just the face) - I think the first is quirky and has character and far prefer it!

xx

Thanks Bob for explaining

Thanks those that like the original too Much appreciated, I am quite pleased with this shot and the cow has personality.

Why are you shooting poor defenceless cattle?

I agree with Bob that the background is drawing too much attention, but I'm not sure a crop is the answer.
At the moment the cow is looking as little under exposed and lacking in contrast, while the trees are nice and bright. Some tweaks with a couple of of levels adjustment layers will make a big difference.