Photo Critique Please?

Pretty sure trolling since some of your other work is solid and there is little reason to smooth the skin of a baby but just in case:

I think I have some constructive feedback that can help you level up.

So firstly the child only consumes around 40% of the frame. 20% of the frame is dead space.

One of the largest elements is the bow. I think using a bow is fine but it should not exceed the size of the child's head or compete for frame space.

Its common for the subject in a photo to be larger, more sharp or contain more contrast for example. For me the bow is competing for subject focus since it is a very very large element and it is in sharp focus.

Consider cropping the image to say 1539x1024 and moving it up it up slightly so it includes a hint of the bow. you don't necessarily have to include full objects the mind fills in the rest. The bow will not cause problems and the focus will remain the face of the child. To me that is a stronger composition. It is not important to include the full bow nor show the wall. Where the child is is not important. Only the face, the blanket and the bow. Only include that.

I don't like the fact the face is in shadow rather than lit. The exposure is 1 stop under if you were not able to light the face and could have been fixed that way.

The image has a pretty severe magenta color cast. Remove it and the image will have a much softer natural appearance.

I realize that you softened the skin but I think you use some kind of high pass filtering technique. Its not good if a person can guess how it was done. I see that you made a strong effort to retain texture but to me it looks unnatural.

You also have some blurry brush marks near the left shoulder and on the edges of the arm and such.

The chromatic abberation is a bit distracting for me. Consider desaturation of aqua and replacing it with the color of the hair.

The bump in the material in front of the face might be slightly too large but overall good job controlling that and the consistency of the pleating. Great job getting the image sharp. Normally I wouldn't thank someone for that but I do around here because it is not that common.

Alright quickdash. That is my feedback for you. I hope what I said helps you think about how you could make changes in post and helps you get better captures in camera.

This is really nice image thank you for sharing it.

You took a photo of a bow, not a baby. The bow is WAY too dominant and it is what is in focus, not the baby. It is obvious you are letting the camera pick the focus point because it will always pick the nearest item, which is the bow. Avoid such distractions in the future and learn how to control where the camera focuses. Also, as has been said, the color is not right. Use some type of white balance control to target in RAW conversion.

steve

It's a lovely peaceful creature not so much in focus; also upper right white corner is uncompensing and disturbing the image. If all this area is completely white and you can't darken it just a bit, try to turn all the photograph very very slightly to a light beige tone

I kind of feel like the skin is too soft. I also think the composition is a little uncomfortable. You should have turned the camera a little to the left to put her head more to the right of the frame.

I think you did a very good job on it.

I think this looks amazing!