Mini challenge : Help with a photo ?

[conuk]

Ok its my nieces birthday soon - thought Id give her mum a cute snap that I took on my Canon Ixus 800Is.

Plan on making a nice A3 photo of it if i can via a HP B9180 printer I bought recently.

Original photograph is here (not very good I admit... but she never keeps still for long ! and just had it on auto )

original photo

A black and white I made from it is here
black and white

and a modified colour one here.
modified colour

Would any of you guys like to make a better job of the photo ? Mini challenge

Would appreciate any help or recomendations I could make with my minimal Photoshop skills.

 

[King Arthur]

thats a great photo mate, shows her a genuinly happy to be posing and full of life, i like the black and white one as it very artisitc so a good job i recon .

No tips for ya other than keep up the good work

Phil

 

[alexisonfire]

I like the 3rd one best of all, but the editing has giving he impression hat the photo was overexposed. You might want do a tighter crop removing the lamp etc on the left, and also have a play with levels and contrast to sort out the overexposure.

 

[A.N.Other]

I know you'd like the keep the size and orientation as it is if you're printing on A3, but I have to say this would look a lot better cropped to portrait. I've done a crop as I would do it, with a colour and B&W version.

Colour: http://img409.imageshack.us/img409/8416/miabedoriginalav8.jpg
B&W: http://img104.imageshack.us/img104/3953/miabwlk3.jpg

 

[pixie_ladyxx]

um well i cropped it and just changed the photo so that i like it, dunno if others would

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d45/pixie_ladyxx/photoforafriend.jpg

 

[conuk]

thanks for the comments people. Yep, liking the tighter crops.
And yeah I guess 3rd one does look a overexposed... will have another play with that.

Anybody else feel free to have a go.
Thanks again.