Puppy Love (Boy and Puppy)

[goldt3]

I'm still working on composition. The last portrait I posted had been revealed as cropped way to tight. So, I went back to the drawing board. I found this little boy playing in the water feature in the park. It struck me that he stopped right amidst the water when he saw the puppy. It was almost like the rest of his world was paused for a second. Long story short, I found the subject captivating. I hope was able to capture his apparent joy.

How did I do? Any suggestions for improvment are gladly accepted!!


Exif data
Camera SONY DSC-H20
Exposure 0.001 sec (1/2000)
Aperture f/4.4
Focal Length 63 mm
ISO Speed 400
Exposure Bias 0 EV




This is the first pic I had posted for critique. Any opinions on wether or not I've improved?

[Martin Apolonio]

there is always something amazing about a boy and his dog. The first things that come to mine are to try and get closer. Focus on telling the story of him and the dog. Also for outside the ISO seems a little high. I can see some grain coming through. The other photo has great colors but if only we could see a little bit of her face

[Lois khalafalla]

It is such a sweet picture. I do wish the boy and puppy were more isolated. But sometimes we can't always get that. His expression is pricless!

[MrJones]

it feels a bit over exposed. you could have taken the ISO to 200 or even 100 and get less noise and less exposure which for my opinion would have nailed the photo.

[goldt3]

Thank you for taking time to look at the photograph. I am just coming out of the "auto" mode in my camera and was experimenting with ISO. I have realized, as you say that the ISO above 200 does create much more noise than I was happy with. I'll go 100 or so for the next time out doors and come in closer. I used a longer focal length because I wanted to try and throw the background out of focus. I heard this can work to shorten the depth of field? Could have backfired a bit ... lol
Maybe just a better choices on focal length and ISO will make the next shot better! I feel like I'm learning a lot... so thank you for offering your expertise!

[kristenh]

you can open your aperture to get a shorter depth of field- that is, use a smaller aperture number. but with that iso #, if you had done that, it would have been even more overexposed- see how the boy's hair is just a bright spot w/ no definition? that would have been worse. it looks like there probably wasn't any angle you could have shot from to avoid having people in the background, so i can see why you'd want to blur the background a bit. it's also really hard to shoot in direct sunlight like that. maybe you could go back to that spot late in the day when the light is all golden? might get great shots then.

[goldt3]

I agree. That spot has a lot of interesting subjects and would have been more easily photographed in evening light. I really struggle with midday light and I think I may just avoid it entirely until I'm more experienced! lol