This photo was taken with just moments to get the shot. Many people wanted to photograph this wonderful lady and I'm thankful she let me get the last shot. Also, there we so many people out that day that out of 500 or so shots, only a few gave me enough of a quality background that was mostly free from obstructions or people.
Mind you, I didn't know this woman who was nice enough to let us all take pictures of her. Glad, I did.
Very interesting subject matter. The blue sky is rather unnatural, unless thats how you want it. I just tried 2 edits, personally perfer it cropped a bit tighter. Looks striking in black and white.
Mono is great, odd as a lot of colour in the original but stripping it out enhances it.
other monochromes of the day did work, but even there, the color was a hair more interesting. i made both from a few shots.
I think it is the face paint in the first shot posted that lends itself to mono for me. The subsequent shot I can't really tell if full colour or mono is best.
I have a version that is cropped almost exactly like yours, yes. The blue is nearly as blue as it was that day. We had a very impressive blue sky Saturday, but yes, intentionally we wanted to see the blue compliment the intensity of the colors in her outfit. I did a mono of the shot but as so much effort was put in by the participants to highlight vibrant colors, I differed to the brilliant colors.