Took a few pics for photography class, wanted to see what you guys think. This was taken with the canon kit lense. I'm upgrading to a t3i or 60D with the sigma 2.8 in July or August.

Here are the pics:

 

Just out of curiosity, do you do any sort of processing? Or are these straight out of the camera?

 

I'm not a pro, but I can tell you what I found eye appealing, others will have a different and likely a professional opinion. The first one I found distracting..it almost made me dizzy, too much blur not enough subject? I like the yellow flower pic for color contrast,not sure if the second flower should be out of focus or not. It's likely a matter of preference, and what you were looking to accomplish. I like the bench pics. Cool subject and the pic draws the eye in. At least it did mine. I like the kitty pic too.

And oh, I have the twin of your cat! You can see her markings. Hope you don't mind if I add two pics to your thread.

 

The flower photos, except the 2nd, lack color contrast to their backgrounds. Either look for an angle that includes a better background or you'll have to post process (e.g. darken the background slightly).

Your bench shot is not properly centered, though it may be level. Look at either where the paths intersect the sides or at the leg-rails of the bench. One of those two things (paths or rails) should be perfectly even... or else much further off (intentional). It just looks sloppy here.

I like kitty.

In general the images are missing some tonal contrast (levels or curves adjustment). They are flatter than they could be.

 

Yeah this are straight out of the camera, I don't know how to do a proper adjustment after. Next class they are teaching us basic stuff of photoshop.

I guess I see what you're telling me in the first one I guess I could crop it. Yeah I've seen a lot of cats with that same colors and pattern lol.


Thanks for the suggestions I will keep them in mind for next time. But just for my understanding what do you mean by color contrast if you could maybe describe it with one of the pics so I can understand it better. (Sorry just a n00b trying to learn to take good pictures). On the bench the paths I can't really use because the bench is much closer to the right path it was not centered to both and I was a little bit more to the right side of the bench because there was an orange stick like behind in the picture. I guess the better option would have been to move it and sit center to the bench. Lesson learned pay more attention to detail.

Thanks all for the comments and please keep them coming.

 

Which camera did you use and which kit lens? There have been a lot of kit lenses, 18-55, 18-55 IS, 17-85 IS, 28-135 IS...

Overall, the images are soft. The 2nd photo is probably the best, but it is front focused.

How do you focus? Do you just use all the AF points? That will focus on the nearest object.

You might get better results by picking an AF point near the subject. Typically I use the center point only, focus and then recompose. This is easier if you use back button focusing.

Re:1 I don't like it, but can't really describe why.

Re:2 Fix the focus and maybe crop out some of the right. I'd kill the dark area and stem with two leaves on the top right. They are distracting.

Re:3/4 The second flower shortly behind the first is distracting.

Re:5 Soft/dull.

Re:3/4/5 They are all too similar. You should pick your best one of them and only show that one.

Re:Bench, agree with penforhire. Tight dead on shots are really difficult. You need to make sure everything is even and perpendicular.

Re:Cat. I don't like the eyes. They are open or fully closed. In addition, they look a little OOF. It looks like the body was the focus point. The eyes should be sharp.

 

Shoot RAW and start using Digital Photo Professional. It's a good starting point for simple post processing.

 

I have the canon xs and the lense is the 18-55 IS

I do focus with just the 1 center point. Teacher told us to do that, guess I have to learn to focus better. I think I focused on the flower then moved the camera to the right, maybe I should have changed the focus point or focus another place. (Maybe this is why the shots are soft?). I do have another pic with the second flower focused but none of the two.

I see what you're saying about 2. Just saw the 2 leaves you're talking about and you're right they are distracting, I guess because I took the pics I always look at the flowers.

3, 4 and 5 I guess it would have been better to choose another flower.

I don't remember what I did with the cat that was a couple of weeks ago.