My son's girlfriend came to visit before he leaves for Army basic training. The morning she left we went down to a local park so I could get a few shots of them. These are pretty much straight off the camera with a little cropping and straightening.

How could I have done better?

I'm trying to get better at this. My biggest frustration is focus. I seem to be dead on and then when I look at my images they just aren't where I want to be.

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I think 7 is the best of the group. Thank him for his service.

for taking the time to respond.

What makes 7 the best. What could I have done better on the others.

I will pass on your thanks. Was hoping he'd do Navy like his mom, but I'm just happy he's doing something with himself.

I'm not seeing any issues with focus that scream that there is a problem. I myself am still trying to better recognize out of focus and motion blur when I look closely at my pictures. Then of course there is ruling out any actual problems with the lens, and some lenses are sharper then others.

Overall I like the shots. I know zero about posing people for shots, but the one thing that does tend to bug me is when little bits of body parts get cropped off. The tip of the toes or feet in a few of these. I'm guilty of it too, so I'm constantly trying to remind myself to check all the edges of the frame to make sure I'm not so focused on middle, that I forget about everything else.

Oh, and I'd probably would have skipped the sunglasses in #2, took me a minute to figure out "what is around his neck?"

Keep up the good work! I look forward to seeing more.

Nice shots. Something that jumps out at me is cutting off toes/fingers. Watch for that.

i would have to agree take a little more time check that you havent cut off feet heads etc. i dont know what focus point you used but i use just one focus on the eyes if possible if not the head then recompose the shot. you are using a shallow dof so that may be causing you to think you have focus issues. i would also shoot RAW and use some pp and add some sharpening. good luck

For what it's worth, I don't get why people get up in arms (so to speak) about cut off heads/feet/etc. It doesn't bother me one bit. The subject of the photos is rarely arms/feet/toes/fingers, and if you compose the shot to show off the subject (their smiles, heads, etc.), and as a result some limbs get cropped, who cares? Focus looks pretty good to me too though you might be shooting a slightly too slow a shutter speed so there's a bit of motion blur, I suspect (though it's a bit tough to tell at this resolution). For my taste, a couple of the shots are washed out and could use a bit more black to pump up the contrast -- 5 most notably, but 3 and 7 too. I'd crop #8 closer, get rid of some more of those feet/legs & extra space above their heads -- bring the attention in closer to the kiss.

Thank you everyone. I am definitely taking note.