Wonderful work on this assignment. This is exactly what we were hoping you would accomplish with this project.
With this assignment it’s important to analyze both photographs. There is a lot to learn from the composition of a “beast” photograph as well. For instance, in this case, the edges of the frame are incredibly cluttered and full of amputation (i.e. cutting off of secondary objects around the 4 walls of your photograph). This is a common mistake made that occurs because a photographer is paying a disproportionate amount of attention to the center of the composition with little, or no regard for the edges of the frame.
Your second photograph corrects this technical issue by cleaning up the 4 walls of the composition. There are no more cluttered objects around the edges of your composition. The few small areas that secondary objects can be seen are in soft enough focus that the amputation isn’t distracting.
This leads me to my next point: It’s often impossible to perfectly clean up the edges in your background. Using a shallow depth of field will help you soften your focus in the background and make any amputation that occurs less noticeable. It’s only when the amputated objects are in sharp focus that the composition becomes distracting.
Secondly, you’ve done a great job of incorporating depth into your composition. Your first image is flat and 2 dimensional. It’s also void of any strong design element.
Your second image however, uses a strong foreground, middle ground and background which creates the illusion of three dimensions. Not only that, but you’ve incorporated “line” as your primary design element. The lines in the keyboard act as a “leading line” (You’ll learn about this concept in an upcoming lecture) helping to guide your audience’s eyes into your composition from the bottom-left corner. Great work overall!
You’re off to a great start!