How to choose the best pic for advertising a giveaway...

I'm just writing on a blog post for my other blog, presenting my newest contest/giveaway (sponsored by Bello Modo -- check out their website if you like the beads pictured here). Writing is not much of a problem, nor creating the answer form I'm trying this time (I make filters to filter out entry e-mails, but they don't work if people don't write the headline I ask them to). It's choosing what pic is the best to put at the top of the post. The one that'll attract beaders and want them to participate.

One thing you can do is ask someone else. I did that. Only problem was that among the four pics I'd singled out half of the beaders I asked preferred the first one and half wanted the second one... How much does that help? Well, it did help a bit as they confirmed they liked both my favourites. The above pic is of the photo that came in second, beaten by just one vote.



The winning pic, below featured without frame, is coincidentally also the pic I used to make a small logo for the contest. I'm using it in my sidebar, but also allowing others to use it to promote the giveaway. (Or maybe it's a very similar photo -- I took perhaps 30-40 pics in total of these beads.)



The biggest difference between the two is that the photo that came in second has more detail, you can see more of the beads, but the "winning" photo have more or less just one bead in focus -- but as the bead is in the front of the pic i "communicates" with the beholder. It makes the pic more open and inviting even if we don't get a good look at the rest of the beads. If you like green it attracts you more than the other photo where a green blurry bead unfortunately pop up in the front corner.


One thing I had problems with when shooting the beads was the colours: the erinite green and tanzanite blue works lovely together, but pairing these shiny soft beads with the matte ruby red ones was difficult. Hence why they're in the background of most of the pics. Sometimes almost missing like in the one above. While I couldn't use that pic, of cause, I felt good taking a couple of photos like that as that was what my mind was screaming: shoot the blue and green, the blue and green. When I had done that I could say "fine, now I've done that, let's get back to doing something good with all the prize beads."

Is there some sort of moral of the story here? I think it's just the one I always give people: take many pics, try different angles and ways to present the same motif. Don't give up even if it's a difficult motif. Crop the same photo in different ways to see if it enhances the picture. And if you don't know what pics to post, ask the target audience (if your friends belong to that group it can be even better).