What is wrong with my photos? C&C Advice needed.

I am going through my learning curve as a newbie and would appreciate some advice.
I took these pictures yesterday at a local park and I find them to be so plain.
I don't have a handle of what the problem is. It seems like the color does not stand out and the pictures seems to be not sharp?

I can think of a number of potential issues :
1) I took these pictures hand held - very busy at the park on a Sunday so even though I have my tripod with me I did not use it.
2) All except for the first picture I set the AP to 22 thinking that will make sure the DOF is widest so everything is sharp but I think because of that the shutter speed is slow. Together with taken hand held made it worse.
3) Would the color be better if it around dusk or dawn?
3) Is it the gear? I stop using the kit lens and these are taken with the Tamron 17-35 lens. Maybe my copy of lens is soft?
4) I have not learn how to do PP yet. So these pictures are as it from the camera except that I resized them to post.

Maybe it is all of the above... I plan on going back to the park and start experimenting.
I would appreciate any advice, comments and critiques.
Thanks.

#1 1/200 11 17mm

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I can see your shutter speed is really too slow for sharp hand held shots. You want to be keeping at 1/60th or more ideally if shooting hand held unless you have a very steady hand and not other factors that could induce shake

F22 is bad. While you get maximum depth of field you also start getting affected by something called deffraction. What this means is that if you stop down much more than F11 then the images will actually be softer. F11 is a pretty good spot for max DOF at 17mm anyway.

When the sun is lower in the sky you get better colours, but you also get contrast.

Probably not. More likely technique.
You give yourself a hard job - photograph the park in the midday sun when there are people about.

A bit of PP always helps, even it it is just a tweak of the levels and saturation - it can bring the best out in a photo.

Looking at your shots #1 is the best of the bunch. You shutter speed is high enough to hand hold and your aperture is F11, which as you can see provided bags of DOF.

When you go back pick your scene first, decide what you would like to see in the image. Those rocks on the shore make for nice foreground interest and would look great with the early morning/late evening sun on them.
Get down lower, large expanses of water can be pretty uninteresting and a lower angle will make even the largest expance of water take up less of your frame.
TRIPOD!!!
With a slow shutter speed and tripod you cam give the water a reall nice smooth look, exposures of 1/4 second or longer will have this effect, plus when working in lower light you will need a tripod anyway.
FOr tripod shooting either get a cable release or use the self timer and if your camera has it mirror lock up.

Hope this helps & good luck!

Thank you so much for your advice... I will definitely go back to try them out. That's what learning is all about
The point about the steady hands... I have to admit I do have a railing to rest my elbows on so that I don't pretend to have very steady hands I will definitely use a tripod next time which means I need to go on a weekday evening Luckily the park is not far....

Don't be afraid to buy a monopod, they can certainly help a lot where you don't want to take up much space but need a good support

I do have a monopod! ( this prompted me to edit my signature) But the few times that I tried taking pictures with it, it is not that much steadier than hand held. :d but I think that is another thing that need practice. I read an article somewhere that talks about the proper way of using a monopod.. let me check..
Here it is...
http://www.outdooreyes​.com/photo5.php3

I tried but I think I need more practice with it still.

It's a very good sign that you can acknowledge there is room to improve here.

Very often I find myself very capable of noticing errors in my photography - but ONLY at the computer, and not at the point of taking the photo!!

I'm not sure you should need a mono-pod/tripod. It seems you have plenty of room to get the shutter up to a holdable speed. Bringing the f-stop down to f11 as suggested will give you some more speed. I would suggest practicing handholding. It can be learned and resorting to support under these conditions shouldn't be necessary with any normal lenght lens.

As to post processing - it's something you're going to need to learn soon. I copied a couple of your images and ran some Shadow/highlights, contrast, and USM on them and they looked much better. Simple stuff to do. Overcoming the technical issues should be just a matter of learning. Finding artistic shots will be much more difficult IMO.

Keep shooting.

There is already some great advice here. I know when I'm in that shooting situation (mid-day sun) a polarizing filter can really help with some of the color and lighting issues..but will sometimes result in longer exposure times. My $0.02..

just for fun...

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Thanks folks for your advice!
dkenny, that is really something! Did you do any other pp other than chaninging it to B&W? I really like the effect. especially with the light and shadows on the rocks... great work

polarizer!!!

If you want more colors to pop like the sky and such I would look into adding a circular polarizer to your collection of stuff, it can make a world of difference.

I will look into a polarizer for sure. Thanks. Would it require exposure compensation also? I have considered getting one before but am afraid it would mean one more variable to have to play with. Thought it may be too much for a newbie like myself.

You're grasping with dynamic range. #1 would be better if you lightened the shadows a bit (PSE has it).

I don't think it would be too much. With a circular polarizer you can rotate the filter to adjust the desired look you want. The exposure compensation tends to be small for most shots.
Get a decent filter if you have good equipment. There are quite a few threads discussing brands, models, etc...
Have fun.