Jolly Good - a Lab picture

[Peach]

As always, the only semi-willing model I have currently is my chocolate Labrador, Nilla.


Jolly Good by JustPeachee, on Flickr
(please full view it; Flickr is doing a weird sharpening thing to this picture)

Exif:
Exposure: 1/30 (yes, I know I should have used a slightly faster shutter speed)
Aperture: f/8
Focal length: 55
ISO 400

This was what I would consider heavily post-processed, including sharpening, curves, exposure adjustment, brightness, saturation, color adjustment, levels adjustment, selective sharpening (for her eyes), and more I'm probably forgetting...oh crop, that was important lol

My questions:

a) Composition: Is it composed ok? Is your eye drawn more to her eyes or somewhere else? (I was wondering if maybe the buckle on her collar was distracting, specifically). Would you have centered it more?

b) Post-processing: Does it look ok to you? I do tend to favor the more saturated looks for her pictures so you'll see the same kind of "style" throughout the other pictures of her I have. Would you have muted the colors more or ...?

c) Her left (picture) eye: The pupil was slightly washed out by the slightly overcast sky we had when I took the picture. Better than having a bright blue sky (had this problem with another pet picture), but it did wash out her pupil. I attempted to fix it. Does the fix work or is it too distracting?

Thank you.
P.S. The title isn't necessarily because I think the picture is "jolly good" but more so what I was thinking in my head when I was looking at the picture. Such as "jolly good there ol' chap, now let's run along and get some crumpets." Be kind, eh, it's been a rough week lol

[etexjess]

Originally Posted by Peach

As always, the only semi-willing model I have currently is my chocolate Labrador, Nilla.

This was what I would consider heavily post-processed, including sharpening, curves, exposure adjustment, brightness, saturation, color adjustment, levels adjustment, selective sharpening (for her eyes), and more I'm probably forgetting...oh crop, that was important lol

My questions:

a) Composition: Is it composed ok? Is your eye drawn more to her eyes or somewhere else? (I was wondering if maybe the buckle on her collar was distracting, specifically). Would you have centered it more?

I didn't notice the buckle at all until you mentioned it. My focus went immediately to the face and my first thought was how you got such detail, I always have trouble with the darker animals getting this kind of sharpness.

b) Post-processing: Does it look ok to you? I do tend to favor the more saturated looks for her pictures so you'll see the same kind of "style" throughout the other pictures of her I have. Would you have muted the colors more or ...?


c) Her left (picture) eye: The pupil was slightly washed out by the slightly overcast sky we had when I took the picture. Better than having a bright blue sky (had this problem with another pet picture), but it did wash out her pupil. I attempted to fix it. Does the fix work or is it too distracting?

Thank you.
P.S. The title isn't necessarily because I think the picture is "jolly good" but more so what I was thinking in my head when I was looking at the picture. Such as "jolly good there ol' chap, now let's run along and get some crumpets." Be kind, eh, it's been a rough week lol

I like the coloring, not so much a fan of that crop, merely because I think there is too much green empty space.

the 'fixs' that you did on this picture is not obvious at all to me as an amateur. And even after you telling me about the pupil I still don't see anything...

lovely shot in my opinion!

[dolphin1]

You have a beautiful dog!

[Peach]

Originally Posted by etexjess

I didn't notice the buckle at all until you mentioned it. My focus went immediately to the face and my first thought was how you got such detail, I always have trouble with the darker animals getting this kind of sharpness.



I like the coloring, not so much a fan of that crop, merely because I think there is too much green empty space.

the 'fixs' that you did on this picture is not obvious at all to me as an amateur. And even after you telling me about the pupil I still don't see anything...

lovely shot in my opinion!

Thanks for your comments. The detail, sharpness, and whatnot has a lot to do with fiddling in post. I shot in RAW (as always) and adjusted the sharpness, contrast, and colors there, then in CS5 adjusted the levels, coloring again, saturation, etc. Takes a bit and is unique to each picture I find.

The crop I do like. I thought about centering her, but because she isn't looking dead straight at the camera (and her body is slightly crooked), the off-to-the-side worked better for me. I do understand what you mean about the green space though. Might play with the crop some more.

Originally Posted by dolphin1

You have a beautiful dog!

Thank you! She's my goofball.