Both photographs are really good. There are so many interesting elements within these pictures. The textures in hands as well as the texture within sculptures make for some interesting subject matter. Although this lecture wasn’t a black and white assignment I’ll take the time to correct a few of the mistakes that were made within the world of black and white photography. First however, I want to comment on one other element within your photograph.
Although the composition within these photographs is interesting, there are some minor details that really stick out. The most important one being the “amputation” of your subjects by the 4 walls of your photograph. As stated in your learning material you need to be careful about the objects around the 4 edges of your photograph. Look at all professional photographs and notice how they rarely amputate a primary object, and when they do it looks purposeful and well managed. In your first picture of the hands, notice how you “amputated” the ends of the person’s fingers with the left hand wall of the photograph. It’s just the tips of the fingers that are missing but it’s very distracting. Try not to put all of your focus on the center of the frame. Pay attention to all 4 walls of the photograph and how they are interacting with your subject matter. Amputation is one of the most common mistakes that photographers make, but luckily it’s also one of the easiest to fix.
Secondly when shooting black and white, and especially when you’re shooting things like hands and sculpture with lots of texture in them, make sure you have nice side lighting and you increase the contrast in your photographs by turning down the exposure slightly. Notice how in the photograph below by increasing the contrast I was able to get rid of some of the boring grey tones and increase the amount of “tonal range” in the photograph. It makes black and white photographs much more interesting.
Great work. Keep it up!