I took far too many photos today. It'll be difficult to pick 3 of my favorite to upload to the World Pentax gallery. I shot surfers, my youngest son's baseball game and an amazing display of daisies that were almost as tall as I am and a few miles long! I do think one of these shots below will be one of my three. I'd like help with which one you like the best. YES there are subtle differences.
1)


2)


3)


Come on, I know you're looking. Please if you open up and look, tell me what you think.
oh btw, this was taken with that ratty old purple fringe monster...the tamron 70-300.
It's my favorite lens.

[k100d]

#1 the fence adds nothing to the composition

[sajmmiller]

I prefer the background and eyes in #1. I'm with you on the Tamron 70-300; I like mine a lot too. Nice shot, BTW.

[Bramela]

No.1 is my choice/ less sitractions in background. All great shots.

[dermc]

I like #1. I like seeing his eyes.
derm

[LaRee]

I am so pleased to get so much input on my request here. It was a pleasant surprise to come home and find this after work today. Thank you all for your responses. I think #1 has the lead and I prefer that one myself. The hat being clipped doesn't bother me because I've seen professionals crop the top of peoples heads off to aide in compositions. Granted that is mostly with groups of two or three in the shot but still....
Again, thank you very much to each one of you who took the time to post.

[roentarre]

I go for the first shot without any distraction at all. BTW this is a stellar image. The glare into the sky diagonally gives a lot of lift in the image. His face has the roughage, baptised by the time and life experiences.

A bar in the 2nd image divides the viewer's attention - less than desired.

The third image has the surrounding but not enough to provide information on the setting. A wider angle lens would produce that feel better. The idea is good but it does not work that well here.