[Steven Sweeney]

I'll have a go, beginning with an admission that I suffered during formal training from a somewhat unorthodox sense of composition. Many things that folks love, I find to lack dynamic quality, and things they don't like, I read as having energies of potential movement, space filled with intention (which I've discovered anew in Oriental work), and the sorts of slight imbalance and non-"Golden" placement that, like color discords, draw you into the piece and hold you in an unexpected, "sideways", often nonclassical way. With that caveat, my quick thoughts (quick not as uncaring but in the sense of omitting overanalysis -- HA!! As if!):

#1. I like the little guy's expression here best of all the photos. Realizing that you're not without further compositional options, and looking only at the photo itself, I'd caution you to remove all branches from behind his head -- they sort of resemble elfin antlers of some kind -- and to reconsider the positioning of his vertical posture dead center in the midst of a lot of very busy background. Even liking the facial expression, I'd note that there's not much information in there in terms of values (and particular the effect on form). Finally, I think you'll be disappointed in a portrait that hides his arms and hands so completely.

#2. A forced-looking pose, making him look unnatural and uncomfortable. And again nearly dead-centered. In this and other poses, he's looking off to our right. Perhaps his mom is standing over there behind you as you're shooting the photos. I think you want this fellow to look at you. There's something about his eyes that I want to look into, and it's lost when he appears to be distracted. A complicated background unless abstracted, and one with values not very different from the boy's. Also, the heads of grass (sorry, I don't know the flora) near the boy's head will be only distracting, and add nothing to the composition in their present location.

#3. More boyish, up a tree, but still so stiffly posed that he doesn't seem to belong there. Especially noticeable is the straightness of the spine, a very formal note in a tree-climber's posture. The head's turned at 90 degrees to the shoulder, overshooting the pleasing spiral of many poses. He looks awkward and uncomfortable, and his expression is perhaps not pleasant enough to sustain a portrait.

#4. The best, I think, of the references, though I wish his eyes were turned toward you. Now that you're up into the influence of the sunlight, the backlighting can begin to work for you, in the hair, edges of the arms and clothing, around the ankle structure. You might consider keying down the background value, to enhance that backlighting effect. I'm also concerned that the tree limbs or branches are "heavy" in hue and value, and may overpower the weight of the boy (as they will in nature, but this is a portrait of the boy, not the tree), so you'll have to work that out a bit. There might even be options here for reconstructing the tree, to lop off or resize parts. There are green and red effects in the bark of the tree that you wouldn't want to miss, for both their coordinating and complementary usefulness.

#5. Too static. All background. No feet, no arms, no hands. Gaze once again averted from the viewer. Greatest values differentiation is over on the left third of the photo, which is where the viewer's attention will be drawn. It will be hard to find the boy amongst the background elements he's fronting.

I feel a little hesitant to hit "Send" on this, because it probably seems like a negative report, but I do think that another shoot will serve you well. Kids get posed so much in these days of ubiquitous photo-taking, many of them have an automatically fixed and focused "look" that they present to a camera. Get this guy to tell you his favorite joke, or describe his favorite activity, or whatever it takes to lower the veil of a "photo shoot". Keep talking and joking while you take the photos. Avoid the "One . . . Two . . . Three . . ." kinds of pressures. (I'm not saying you're doing this, I'm just thinking out loud about the sorts of things I'd try, to get a more natural and spontaneous look from the subject.) Don't be afraid to zoom in on him a little. You're going to need every bit of information about the boy that you can get, and it's not at all difficult to imaginatively expand the background a little around the edges if you find you're left with some white canvas.

Best wishes. (I first typed Besh wistes, and you can have those too, if they'll help.)