Boy's portrait

[anasko]

Hi!
here is a photo of my friend's son. There was a bunch of good head shots but I love the facial expression in this one particularly.
This is my first time playing with custom settings on the camera and I am not sure that I did a good job. Something is off and I can't put my finger on it.

Is it better to crop it tighter?
Is there any way I can sharpen the boy's eyes?
It was sunny afternoon, my settings were as follows, what could have been done differently?

Nikon D40X lens Sigma 18.0-200.0 mm f/3.5-6.3
f / 5.3 1/125
iso 100
used fill in flash
compensation +0.33


Thank you!

[Photologyst]

Very cute shot!

What you can do now is PS processing.

Since this is a very small photo, there are some limitations on what can be done. So, here is how I would work this photo:






Pull into Lightroom adjust exposure.

To PS to soften features and lighten skin. Select and sharpen eyes in new layer via “Unsharp Mask” & Lab Color method.

Two different crops. Obviously, it would all come out much better with the original, non-degraded photo. Watch the light reflections in the eyes. Mine look a bit too bright/large.

You will have to play with that. The easy way would be to use the "Heal" brush to mitigate the lights.

Also, take care to fix any errant pixels in the original photo.

Mine is the “down and dirty” version.

Others will no doubt give you more ideas.

[anasko]

Originally Posted by Photologyst

Very cute shot!


Watch the light reflections in the eyes. Mine look a bit too bright/large. .

Thank you. Until you brought that up I didn't even notice! As for photoshop I am playing with it, today is my second day, so it is kind of hard to figure out but I will try!

[Photologyst]

Originally Posted by anasko

Thank you. Until you brought that up I didn't even notice! As for photoshop I am playing with it, today is my second day, so it is kind of hard to figure out but I will try!

Check out some PS portrait tutorials: Google

I would urge you to also look at Lightroom for general, photo adjustments. Then pull the photo into PS for special effects. Both are invaluable and can be tested free for a month.

Lightroom does not have the steep learning curve that PS has.

Good luck!