Thanks for your detailed reply and critiques, @bensharpeningcharacter!
@creative-click-photography, maybe next time take two different shots with the same setup, like one with the calendar and another without the calendar in the background. I wouldn’t have known either that Ben didn’t like blank, open calendars in the background.
@abbysherlock, from my perspective, I find the intense lighting complementing well with the gold color and “edgy” style of the clock you have photographed. Perhaps what bothers Ben the most is the cluster of shadows and hands there in the center of the clock where he would have had to somehow overlay the verse.
As for the grainy shot, since you’re shooting still life, set up, indoors and it’s not moving around, you could use a tripod, set the ISO super low (like 100) and let the shutter speed go as long as needed. If the hands of the clock moved creating a blur during the long exposure….perhaps that would be a neat-looking effect! Or you could just take the batteries out of the clock.
Creative way to add color in the background too, by the way, Abby!
It’s good to hear Ben’s explanation of why he likes the picture he chose. There’s a lot of personal preference in his comments, so there’s nothing we could do about that as the photographer, but it’s neat how he says the “more interesting reason [why I chose this pictures] was that it felt like it fit the verse.” The man contemplating in a moody environment. It visually explains his interpretation of the verse. I would say that I’m surprised that he didn’t crop it to make the man’s head not interfere with the text, and that there’s a heavy unnatural vignette in the top corners of the photo, and that overall the split-tone editing style is indeed unnatural, but perhaps those elements play in his interpretation of verse as well.
Good job, everyone! We’ll look forward to the next VPO!