Peking Opera Singer in Beijing, China

[EMansfield]

I was walking through the park containing the temple of Heaven last week and I took this shot of an older man singing traditional Peking Opera to a small crowd that gathered around him. I was wondering what people think about the composition and how clearly the action of singing is conveyed by the image. I also shot a horizontal crop of this scene: Accompanying Horizontal Crop and one with a profile view of the singer's head, but it was too blurry to be usable.



(Canon EOS 40D, f/3.2 @ 50 mm, 1/250, ISO 320)
Thanks for taking a look!

[SusanH1970]

Honestly, if you hadn't mentioned he was singing, I'd have thought it was just a photo of a guy just standing in the crowd (I didn't even notice the microphone till I looked at the horizontal one). The heads in the foreground are distracting, too.

[wmbtaylor]

True, without seeing the additional photos it is hard to tell what this person is doing. The people in the background are out of focus so you cannot get a feeling of emotion from them. In a case such as this I would have tried to focus on one of the audience members and had the singer a bit in the shot but would not have the attention on him.

[BabetteKD]

Originally Posted by SusanH1970

Honestly, if you hadn't mentioned he was singing, I'd have thought it was just a photo of a guy just standing in the crowd (I didn't even notice the microphone till I looked at the horizontal one). The heads in the foreground are distracting, too.

Agreed, I had no idea what I was looking at until I read your description. If the singer didn't move to face different people in the crowd, I would have moved to get to the front or get a better side shot.

[EMansfield]

Thanks for the comments. I do agree that the action of the singer isn't clear enough and I'm intrigued by the idea of shifting the region of sharpness to the audience rather than the singer.