broken down barn

This is not directly relevant to your question, but either your scan is so-so in terms of resolution or you stretched the image size, and it has giant pixels. This hinder a bit the viewing.

More to the point: I think your composition is fine, maybe you should have more precise terms than "punch." Ask yourself: what did you want to express by photographing this barn? What impression where you seeking: horror? pity? calm? other? The impact of a photo is not a one-dimension variable.

There's nothing to pull the viewer in. What is it you want me to see? My eye wanders aimlessly around and around. How important is it to have the trees in the background in focus? Control your depth of field. Pick a different time of day when the light is more interesting. Don't shoot at noon.

A bit less contrast over all would help the illusion of texture.
Texture in my mind could be the main subject or the "grabber"
to pull the viewer into this image. I have no problem with composition, but I am unsure what you want me to see as is.
The image as is is very close to "Chalk and Soot", caused by the near blown hilights and shadows.

Charlie.......................

I think you may be surprised at the difference you can make by using the Ilford filters.

If you make a series of prints using the 1 1/2, 2 1/2 and 3 1/2 filters, you will see a great difference in the horizontal timbers on the wall facing the sunlight.

This picture appears to have been taken in full mid afternoon or mid morning sunlight. As you are inexperienced with developing and printing, playing around with the different Ilford filters will give you a greater chance of getting a more pleasing and/or quite different picture.

One last thing about filters. I would suggest that you make all of your printing exposures with the Ilford filters in the enlarger, but slide them out for focusing and composing the image. Human eyes don't see things very well in a magenta light.

Mick.

Thanks for the thoughts, everyone.

WFWHITAKER- hit it right on, nothng to pull you in. It just seems kind of dull, compositionally. I tried to use the fence to lead the eye to the barn, but not enough fence, too much barn.
And yes, direct ovehead light didn't help things. Should have waited for some warmer light later in the day.
I'll try a couple prints with the filters- I haven't tried them yet, because I honestly don't quite know what they are for, aside from affecting the contrast somehow. (I haven't gotten that far yet in my Ansel Adams Guide to Photography )

Okay take the print make to L shaped framing pieces of white card board and start framing or croping different parts of the print. this should open your eyes to some ideas for future shoots and reprinting the pic and enlarging and cropping.

For a later date maybe but if a lower contrast doesn't show detail in the darkest areas and the negative does then dodging those areas should produce detail. I'd make a small dodger from blue tack and stick it onto a straightened paper clip then practice holding it least half way between the easel and the lens and moving it very slightly while dodging to avoid any sharp lines. If you have an analyser then a spot reading on a section of the negative projection where there is just detail will give you a good idea about what exposure to give the black section. Otherwise it's a question of test strips.

If you printed at a very short exposure then close the lens to give yourself time for dodging. Be prepared to waste paper while learning. My bins fills up quite quickly.

I like the subject and the way the building just appears to have collapsed as if its sides had melted.