Messing around on photoshop, advice is welcome

o ya, i forgot to add, everything is made by me, except i didnt take the picture, and sorry but i dont know who did, it was just on my computer

i dunno, something about it just looks, i guess cheesy

i think the background is a lil too much or i dunno?

ok i worked on it a bit and came up with this. how is it?



heres the link in case i messed up putting the pic in.

http://img450.imageshack.us/img450/7538/lineadcopy6ee.jpg

shit i forgot to turn a layer on and a few other things, here is the real one:




http://img327.imageshack.us/img327/7198/lineadcopy5eq.jpg

well for one thing, the archetypal rectangle frame around the pictures. Get creative and make that different, like make a smooth graffiti sentence running along the top and bottom edges so that they look like they are "behind" the trail of graffiti.

and as for the "empty space", fill with a creative orgy of words, poems, whatever, and make the opacity at like 30%. A good example of this technique is the NS backround. It may look plain dark grey at first but something about it makes it less bland, because there is the NS logo scattered about, and not so blatenly obvious.

so basicly think of it this way: fit as much information and visual stunning things into it as you can, but not every feature has to be really obvious. there is always that "minimalism/beauty in simplicity" approach, which is good, but working with what you have so far, its just not the right approach, so take my earlier advice.

those are just some things that come off the top of my head, Im not an artistic compsition expert or anything. I'm just another random viewer.

oh now I know why minimal opacity is a useful technique. DEPTH! try to make text have a hint of 3D, like its coming AT YOU. then the viewer feels more projected into the piece and its more WOW.

wow i should really stop critiqueing art and do my schoolwork. bye bye.