Is This working

Hi All,

Just after some opinions on this Joker image, i have a hand in tomorrow at the club the comp involves choosing 4 categories out of 11 options one of these being Portraits. I was thinking of trying something different for the Portrait category so have come up with this. There are a few bit's i am not happy with at the moment the feet in particular and maybe the light in the bottom right corner. If you guys think it doesn't work i will abandon it and use something else. Cheers.

Joker by kevin barnes, on Flickr

It's certainly different and will appeal to some people and not to others. I like it anyway.

I have no idea about these competitions, but I find the image quite powerful. If you want picky comments then here goes:

I often photograph our cats on the bed using a fleece and I always have to clone out hair and fluff. There are some specks around his feet that could be tidied up.
If the "ground" is in focus, then I would rather see his toes clearly.
Personal taste only, but I find the contrast a tad too great between the bottom corners.
There is a shadow from his cane which shouldn't be there if the lighting is supposed to be coming from the top left.

I used to be a retoucher for a couple of baby remembrance charities, so tend to be a bit of a perfectionist. Feel free to ignore the comments

Thanks for the comments Zooey, this is my thinking. I try to make the area around shoes soft so they blend in a bit, so trying to make the image not look like it is floating.
I have tried to make it look as though there is light coming from the bottom right, so that's why i put a bit of shadow behind the cane.

But does it actually look like that?, that is the question so not sure wether to use it could be risky.

Well I know nothing about these competitions as I said. I don't see the risk though. If you have nothing else you want to enter, then do your best and go for it

For me it’s almost there, i might be tempted to bleed some of the background into the figure and add some texture over the top.

Think the bottom right is a little too bright, and could be toned down a little as draws my eye and competes with the face for my first look.

As always thanks for the input guy's. I'm not convinced i have this right i might go with another category.