As I'm sure you know, it’s the little details that are most likely to trip us up. Everyone notices the big details – things like “we can’t actually go flying until we start the engines” or “you can’t go outside yet because you’re not wearing trousers”. What most people miss though, are the small details, and that is where a professional eye comes into play.
Professionals, no matter who they are or what they do, get paid to notice the small details that can make a big difference.
The one thing you begin to learn, as you get more experienced in photography, is to always look around the viewfinder to check the small details. With this image, my guess is you were concentrating on the big detail – your granddaughter – but my professional eye is seeing two smaller details that are rather distracting.
One is the highlight above the little girl's head. As much as I want to dwell on your granddaughter's face, the highlights above her head are dragging my eyes upwards.
The second problem is that you have truncated the girl’s arm in an awkward way. Ideally I would like to see the whole arm included in the frame.
Now, I know you are likely thinking to yourself that this little girl was moving at a million miles an hour and so you were probably lucky to even get this photo, but all you had to do to place the highlights behind her head and get more arm into the picture was simply to lower the camera position about four inches.
Remember, look at the big details in the picture, and then take a second to scan about for the small details!
My Granddaughter
