Here are some pictures of my friend and her boyfriend. They were nice enough to be my models for the day.
Hi Jessica, some quick thoughts:
This first pciture of thr couple on the balcony is spoiled by a dtraction of the bright area on the top left. I'd simply crop away the top of the entire pciture, about 3/4" on the screen view, so that the pictures is intimate and the backgrounf give a rustic context of golden and gree leaves and trees.
This next picture I'd crop away 1/2" from the left border and the same or less from the bottom. This is a picture with an attractive natural dome surrounding the lovers and it works.
The next picture I didn't go for, as it seemed more a snap shot and it didn't spark interest to me, so I removed it from commenting on.
Your last picture is a paradoxical challenge. The couple is well posed and photographed, but so is the landscape. The challenge is to balance them. To me, a snap shot makes no such decision. I'd consider the couple to be most important given their size in the image. I'd just accentuate that by removing the top 1/2" or a little more from the top of the picture so that the landscape is definitely in the b.g. This devotes a greater proportion of the real estate to the main subjects. Then we know what we must primarily focus on. Of course the landscape is so magical that it will not be lost, even when cropped. I have no compunction against removing the sky. The landscape is still so rich in color and texture that we can still do that.
For such images, I'd pick the best and allow us to discuss that, unless the pictures need to be together.
Here that is somewhat the case.
As a general comment, I feel that we have somehow gotten to a state where we want evenly illuminated photographs! Well I understand that a lens that does that is valuable. However, we might also consider darkening the perimeter of pictures in some cases so that the eyes are directed inwards. Selective burning in can enhance a picture.
If everything is uniformly lit, then it's perhaps technically satisfying but often less interesting!
Selective sharpening of important zones of interest and blurring or darkening of less important areas are ways of fine-tuning the presentation of the picture.
Your images may be completed. If so, that they are. Perhaps you might want to pick one of these images and further optimize it if you feel that might work for you too. Then we might see some interesting new versions arise.
Asher