Midnight photo session

[kstiltne]

Stepped out on my porch tonight to find this guy staring at me in the rain, so I did what any sane person would do, went inside to grab the camera, light stand, and a shoot through.

Questions: Color, does it seem too cool? After looking at a photo for a while my ability to judge color gets ruined. Lighting, good balance of highlight and shadow? Composition, too tight, too centered? Of course any other opinions you may have are welcome.










EXIF:
Nikon D50
SB600 full power through umbrella high camera right
1/500
f/8
210mm
ISO 200

I believe that covers all relevant information.

[karen_s]

Wow, that is a sweet shot. And how lucky were you that he stuck around to pose while you got all set up? I love the light on him and the little raindrops.

Anyway, I like what you have. I don't know what color he really is so hard for me to know if he's too cool or warm. On my screen he's a beautiful golden brown. He looks great.

If I were to nit-pick (my special gift), I might suggest experimenting with the crop by coming in ever so slightly from the left and top. It really is nice the way it is so the crop suggestion is more of a "what if I did this" kinda thing just to experiment with. I think this image has lots of options as far as cropping. You could even get by with centering him at the bottom of a square and it would still work. The subject is that strong.

And I have the same problem with color. I often process the images, then look at them again the next day. I usually end up editing them 3-4 times before I'm satisfied. I have one storm shot that took me 5 months to finally be satisfied. Like I said, I'm a nit-picker.

Great shot.

[kstiltne]

Thanks for the input karen, I was pretty surprised that he stuck around for as long as he did as well. I actually took a few 2 second long exposures to get some backlight from the street lamp behind him, and he was so still they still came out sharp. As for the crop, this was the original framing, and I did consider cropping some of the negative space from the left, but I feel it kinda works here.

Anyone else care to add their opinion?

[Janet Coelho]

I think this shot is great, I wouldn't change a thing!