Sand
Power, youth, energy are all represented in this young man. The back drop of soft focus indigo surf and pristine sand say California cost. This young surfer has just immerged form the surf and is jogging up the beach. His posture and body language tells us he has all the enthusiasm for life that youth can bring.
The photographer did what is essential in any action or sports photography, capture the moment. The subject’s weight has just been shifted to his left foot and the next forward stride is about to be taken.
This image violates one of the golden rules of composition. Allow room in the frame for the subject to move into or through it. In this case the moving subject is close to the right hand edge but traveling at only a slight angle to the camera plain. The rule has been bent and in this composition works extremely well.
The only thing I might suggest is to clone out the small bit of debris in the sand next to the right frame edge.
Click on Image
Original 
Modified 
December 12th, 2007 at 1:08 pm
Thank you for your comments. The image was taken at a San Diego surfer’s beach just as the morning fog lifted. I was walking to a pier for some overhead shots of surfers when I saw this surfer approach. It was the only shot taken of him.
As to the placement of the surfer close to the side, it all happened so quickly that I did not pause long enough to frame better. The debris in the lower right was overlooked and its removal does improve the image.
December 12th, 2007 at 2:16 pm
We all take photographs that happened so quickly we don’t have time to think about the composition. Some work and most are not worth the pixels used. The art is in the editing. Knowing what to keep and what to toss is the secret of good photography. The difference between a snap shooter and a photographer is that after their photo trip the snap shooter shows his friends every shot he took. The photographer only shows the ten percent of the images that are worth keeping.
December 13th, 2007 at 6:48 pm
This is an absolute awesome shot! The one think I could comment, if that is ok, would be that there seems to be a little pixilation in the sky at about 1/3 into the photo from the left. This was maybe introduced by increasing the saturation. You could fix this by selecting this area with a strong feathered border and then blur it out with a Gaussian blur. Just my opinion, hope it was helpful.
December 14th, 2007 at 9:07 am
I most likely did increase the saturation, however, I cannot locate any pixelation on my original. Perhaps the lower resolution of the uploaded images is more apt to display these.
Thank you for you compliment.