Reading mode: Light Dark

Portrtait critique needed

Go to last post
It was a cold day outside and very cloudy, maybe that's what caused the flatness of the face (the lacking skin tone) the histogram gave me signals between left and right so taht should be fine right? Or am I missing something there?
here's a link to the full-size pic w Exif:
http://www.pbase.com/image/25020292.jpg
(made it a link because it's a rather large file)

I've used a V1 without flash, because i was standing away quite a bit to get a shallow DOF through zooming.

Maybe you can figure out what wnet wrong.. I appreciate your comments and find them very constructive and made me think more about the photo! (I CAN handle criticism, I asked for it :) I just don't like criticism in the way of "that's no good" and nothing further :) )
Thank you!
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
 
Thanks for your comments, how do you suggest going about your suggested actions?
Member said:
--My eye is drawn to the hair, not a pretty sight,,, then the ear,
then the hand, finally looks for and finds the face......wash the
hair, it will be finer and then deemphasize it some, maybe the ear
and hand are too bright in relationship to the face.. just an
opinion offered in good spirit.
MATT in NE FL.
Click to expand...
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
 
NBot bad. Nice looking model. Try for a reshoot. The two problems I see are the cropped and and also allowing the tip of his nose to cross the line of his far cheek. These are no no's.
mdebrieder said:
Hello portrait friends,

I've mad e portrait of a friend of mine, but something bugs me, I
can't really say what and I find it difficult to look at it "again"
could you give me some fresh views?



I've tried to capture him in "thinking" mode :D so it's not the
hand that bugs me...
thanks in advance.
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
Click to expand...
--
Please visit me at:
http://www.caughtintimephotography.com

 
to me, it seems like you shot the picture from higher than eye level... which is fine if that's the perspective you're going for... but as a general "rule" for standard portraits, head and shoulders are taken at eye level and 3/4 to full are taken at chest to stomach level... also, one thing i notice is that the nose breaks the cheek line... you should try to avoid this... another important part of a portrait is the eyes... try not to show too much white of the eyes...
mdebrieder said:
Hello portrait friends,

I've mad e portrait of a friend of mine, but something bugs me, I
can't really say what and I find it difficult to look at it "again"
could you give me some fresh views?



I've tried to capture him in "thinking" mode :D so it's not the
hand that bugs me...
thanks in advance.
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
Click to expand...
 
you can also back away a little bit to give the camera room to go down more, so that the eyes are placed on the top 1/3rd line, following the "rule" of thirds... sometimes, i even cut the top of the heads off just so i can place the eyes at the 1/3rd line...

ps. i have the word rule in quotes because, these are not really rules... these are just guidelines... there's no rules in picture taking...
Code Monkey said:
mdebrieder said:
Hello portrait friends,

I've mad e portrait of a friend of mine, but something bugs me, I
can't really say what and I find it difficult to look at it "again"
could you give me some fresh views?



I've tried to capture him in "thinking" mode :D so it's not the
hand that bugs me...
thanks in advance.
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
here is another cropping in color and B/W, I've boosted the saturation a lot to get more skin tone visible and I've done a heavy USM on the remaining hairs. I think they turned out better, but I'm going to reshoot with all the tips from you people, thanks for them, I'm a real beginner in portraits, so thanks for the lessons!
here's the color version:



and the B/W



Thanks everybody for your time and input, it is highly appreciated!
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
 
for that particular photo, i think you're better off cropping landscape... the hand becomes too prominent when it's cropped in portrait... this is the best i could do http://www.pbase.com/image/25023870 ...
mdebrieder said:
here is another cropping in color and B/W, I've boosted the
saturation a lot to get more skin tone visible and I've done a
heavy USM on the remaining hairs. I think they turned out better,
but I'm going to reshoot with all the tips from you people, thanks
for them, I'm a real beginner in portraits, so thanks for the
lessons!
here's the color version:



and the B/W



Thanks everybody for your time and input, it is highly appreciated!
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
Click to expand...
 
I think you can squueze a little more something from the original image still. I agree with the suggestion that it works better in landscape.

Here's what I did with it:



Just a quick try, so with some time and care a more refined end result would be possible. I mainly adjusted contrast and noise levels with different settings for the hand and the face, removed some pink from the scalp, added some DOF and changed the nose line.
mdebrieder said:
Hello portrait friends,

I've mad e portrait of a friend of mine, but something bugs me, I
can't really say what and I find it difficult to look at it "again"
could you give me some fresh views?



I've tried to capture him in "thinking" mode :D so it's not the
hand that bugs me...
thanks in advance.
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
Click to expand...
 
mdebrieder said:
mdebrieder said:
--My eye is drawn to the hair, not a pretty sight,,, then the ear,
then the hand, finally looks for and finds the face......wash the
hair, it will be finer and then deemphasize it some, maybe the ear
and hand are too bright in relationship to the face.. just an
opinion offered in good spirit.
MATT in NE FL.
Click to expand...
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
Click to expand...
--Well, washing the hair will automatically make the strands finer in appearance and less obvious...leave it without mouse or what ever appears to be on it, maybe just a little light hair spray..as to the ear and hands comment, if I remember right, the key combo of ctrl-alt-tilde in photoshop will highlight the lighter areas of the image....use the subtract feature of the selection mode and take out the parts you dont want to work on...really easy, if you havent done it, try it you will be surprised how easy it is,then ctrl-J will put the parts you want on a separate layer. Use any number of photoshop tools to decrease the "brightness like quality of these parts" sometimes once on its own layer, a simple levels and the middle slider will blend it down nicely, othere times dodge or burn and other times, take a sample from another area and go over the areas you want with that skin sample with a soft brush set to very low opacity. make several passes rather than one big correction attempt.....sure there are lots of other ways, these come to ming. Notice i didnt comment on the pose,,, i am thinking you posed him as you wanted, just commenting on the , to me , lack of a central focus that draws the eye, because of what i see as distractions to the eye....draws your eye all over, so you dont really "see" the image you intended.....
MATT in NE FL.
 
You meant something in post-processing concerning the hair :)

Thanks for the other tips, I will surely try them out! I've in no way really mastered photoshop, I'm only in the starting phase :) though it is an excellent program!

I agree on the pose, that's something I should really work on, I just don't see it fast enough yet, I really should take way more time before taking a shot!
Thanks for the help!
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
 
I'll be working on the contrast and noise then! Perhaps with some more photoshop hours :) Also, I'm going to reshoot the photo, hopefully tomorrow, if the Dutch weather works with me :) But the practice in PS will surely be worth the time, thank your for the tips,

one question though, how do you add DOF? Did you apply a lens blur to the background? I thought I might try that too!
Thanks again for your time and input!
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
 
well... since you asked... i think the reason why the hand stands out so much is because of the black outfit he's wearing... i tried to crop that picture as portrait but i didn't think it looked good... but if you really want portrait orientation, you can try to zoom out more just enough to show more of the arm... just experiment... i don't know... but i do like how the shoulders are positioned relative to the head... it gives the portrait that classic masculine look...
mdebrieder said:
do you have any tips on how to make it portrait, with the hand, if
I were to shoot this kind of photo again?
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
Click to expand...
 
Thanks for your input! I'm still very "green" in portrait photography and have loads to learn :D thanks to STF and much practice, I think I will get there someday :)

I totally agree on the masculine look, that was something I tried to do, but I was more fixed on the "thinker" concept, maybe that's why I let the hand be so evident! I really should think my shots more through :D
Thanks for your advice!
Michiel
Code Monkey said:
mdebrieder said:
do you have any tips on how to make it portrait, with the hand, if
I were to shoot this kind of photo again?
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
 
the hand that sceams for attention here :) Maybe I can try another angle (maybe more from under the eyes) tomorrow, and see how that turns out!
Thanks again for your time and input!
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
 
mdebrieder said:
Hello portrait friends,

I've mad e portrait of a friend of mine, but something bugs me, I
can't really say what and I find it difficult to look at it "again"
could you give me some fresh views?



I've tried to capture him in "thinking" mode :D so it's not the
hand that bugs me...
thanks in advance.
--
  • Michiel de Brieder -
Enjoying V1..
http://www.pbase.com/giel
Light is no illusion, but we can make it so :D
Click to expand...
--
webdev : http://www.pbase.com/webdev/
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Keyboard shortcuts

f
Forum
m
My threads
Mobile site
About
Editorial content
Cameras & Lenses
Community
All content, design, and layout are Copyright © 1998–2025 Digital Photography Review All Rights Reserved.
Reproduction in whole or part in any form or medium without specific written permission is prohibited.
When you use DPReview links to buy products, the site may earn a commission.
©GPS Media - Guides, Products, Services.
Back
Top