Portraits Outside

[Diana1979]

I took some pics for my sister yesterday. When I started, the lighting was ok, but it kept getting dark. I used a Nikon Coolpix 4300--the only digital camera I have. The results weren't anything like what I wanted. What do you think? Does it look ok?

[sagelike31]

I'm starting to see that portraits are some of the hardest shots to do.
One of the problems that one runs into (which is always my problem and from what it seems here yours) is the posing.

You can see the tenseness in their hands and with his hands on her shoulders.

I would have them talk (maybe about the first time they met or their worst argument) and take candid shots while they talk. I've noticed that once you get people comfortable in front of the camera asking them to pose after is a cake walk.

Other than that great lighting and excellent job catching the sunset in the background. Keep trying it.

[Saralonde]

As it got darker you might have wanted to up your ISO a bit to compensate for the darker conditions. Your aperture was set at 7.6. You could open it up by setting your aperture to a smaller number. That would allow more light into your camera and also create a more narrow DOF (depth of field) which would soften the background a little more. Did your flash fire? If not, using your flash could add more light to their faces.
The couple is posed very nicely, although their hands look like they were holding on for dear life . You also might want to put them in another area next time so she doesn't have a pole coming out of her head . That's something most of us have done at one time or another.

[The Mighty2006]

Nice shot.

Only comment I would have would be to blur the background more to remove the distractions.

[Benji]

I think most people think that taking a nice shot of their friends should be rather easy, that is.........until they try it! :-)

I have several free tutorials on posing and lighting if you want to try portraits again. See below.

Benji

http://www.photocamel.com/forum/tuto...rtraiture.html
http://www.photocamel.com/forum/tuto...ers-image.html
http://www.photocamel.com/forum/tuto...technique.html