Hi Randy,
High sun
elevation (angle above the horizon) is the most predominant cause for this type of rejection because the lighting is indirect. It is a bit like trying to take a portrait of a person in a room, using only lighting on the ceiling. Such a picture may look OK, but will never been as pleasing to the eye as one in which light is trained on the subject from the same (or similar) angle as the camera.
Angle of incidence = angle of reflection.
You can tell a high sun shot pretty easily. Trucks and running gear on such shots can be anything from dull to completely in shadow. Also, the colors on the sides of the equipment usually look dull.
In the case of your shot,
the issue looks to be a little different. It would appear to my eye that the issue here is sun
azimuth (the compass direction from which the sun is coming.) In this case, the sun is not behind you, but rather, 90 degrees or more to your left.
Again, Angle of incidence = Angle of Reflection. The colors and truck detail just don't quite pop.
In my limited experience here, I think this shot might have been more acceptable to the Screeners if you had gone wide and made this train part of a larger scene. As I said, the lighting is not terrible....I could show you some of my REALLY UGLY high sun shots
. As it is, this is what folks here might call a "here's a train" shot, and for that kind of ordinary composition, RP demands more direct lighting.
High Sun
Linear Mode
