Dave, Jason, Russ, Jule,
thank you all for your helpful comments!
Dave, I instantly liked your crop, I think too it focuses more on the emotions of these both. I could have zoomed in more. I dont know if I actually crop it to your suggestion - I already cropped a bit and Im not sure if that leaves enough for printing. But I'll keep the suggestion in mind, thank you very much.
Jason, yes it was also amusing for me! Not so much the boy alone, but he pretty much reflected the overal mood of the people around at this point. This black guy along with his companions tried really hard to lift the spirit but at least in this moment it had little effect. The whole atmosphere on this day was a bit like this. I agree I could have improved on the separation of his head.
Jule, thanks for the remark. You are right it gets improved by making the darks more deep. It was actually pretty harsh sunlight and I tried to counter that with a bit of negative contrast. Now looking at it with fresh eyes, it seems I overdone it.
And Russ, glad you like it! I wondered what you would say
And a word on cropping: In the last months I came to think about Russ preference for uncropped images, and what he said, that the first image is often the best. So in other words, to respect the first try. Well what can I say, its actually right. It's often the first image, and well, a crop maybe improves an image, but the decision at shooting time is of course more important...
Christian