Pet portrait

All comments and critiques welcome. Thank you.

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …ekphotography/7​569456730/

Loose the edge of a stump from the right side of the image...adds nothing. Pershaps a smudge tighter all the way around. Perhaps 20% off the right, 10% off the top - or even a 4x4 crop. But the shot pulls to the right -and it shouldn't.

But I love the look of the dog.... that part worked perfectly. Color and everything works nicely.

I think the large stump just to the dog's left competes too much for the viewer's attention. It has a lot of texture and you nailed the focus so it really stands out in the image.

I copied your image and cropped it to an 8 X 10 portrait with the dog in the viewer's bottom right portion. This helped remove part of the stump and then I tried cloning out the stump which allowed me to give the dog and the wonderful colors my full attention. You don't have image editing allowed, so I won't post my edit, but you might give it a try to see what you think.

I agree with the others; a tighter crop is needed. I'd do it horizontal at the lower left corner though.

Also agree with the others. To be a portrait of the dog, it should be about the dog. For me this photo is of a nice scene with a dog in it.

Im with Gizmo and I mostly do pet photography myself. This is a great picture with a beautiful golden retriever (my favorite breed), but it isn't a portrait of the dog. Do you have any other shots of this dog, perhaps from a lower angle, with the dog taking up most of the framing of the picture?