Freckles

[jansen]

I really like this photo, but I lost his eyes in shadow. Any suggestions appreciated.
Should he be positioned differently, fill flash, different time of day, something else?



EXIF
Exposure 0.001 sec (1/1000)
Aperture f/4.0
Focal Length 55 mm
ISO Speed 250

Thanks for taking a look.

[sk66]

fill light/flash, or a different time of day where the light was coming from more behind you.

I was able to save some thru a shadows/highlights adjustment and layers blending...could use more work though. Do you shoot in RAW?

[MrJones]

if you have photoshop (or any other tool) just use the dodge tool on his eyes, it will bring them back.

[jansen]

Thanks for the comments. I do shoot in raw format and I attempted a little dodge/burn brush work in lightroom, but I found it too unnatural looking. I can take another stab at editing. I don't have photoshop for more sophisticated editing.

As far as what I could have done when capturing the photo, is repositioning the best solution? Would fill flash change the exposure on the rest of his face too much. This was taken about 1.5 hours before sunset.

Thanks for the ideas.

[sk66]

Originally Posted by jansen

As far as what I could have done when capturing the photo, is repositioning the best solution? Would fill flash change the exposure on the rest of his face too much. This was taken about 1.5 hours before sunset.

Nope, "fill flash" is low power flash letting the ambient provide most of the lighting. It probably would have "flattened" his cheeks some at the default setting (by eliminating the shadow lines etc) and might need dialed back a little with a bit of negative flash exposure compensation.

[SusanH1970]

Originally Posted by sk66

fill light/flash, or a different time of day where the light was coming from more behind you.

I was able to save some thru a shadows/highlights adjustment and layers blending...could use more work though. Do you shoot in RAW?

No offense, but you turned him hot pink and way overexposed. And I usually agree with your posts.

The original was pretty much spot on with exposure (well, maybe just a TAD underexposed) and WB. All that lacked was catchlights in the eyes. Using a reflector next time, or simply shooting from slightly above to have the sky reflected in his eyes would work quite well.

[sk66]

Originally Posted by SusanH1970

No offense, but you turned him hot pink and way overexposed. And I usually agree with your posts.
.

Well I said it could use more work!
That's the problem with trying to save something in post...always takes way too much time/effort and it never comes out quite as good as just getting it right to start with. (but yeah, that sucked!)

[jansen]

Thanks for the input.

I want to try a reflector, but I don't have one yet.

The original upload only had a slight increase in exposure in pp. This time a bumped up the overall exposure a little more and I got a better result from the dodge/burn brush. I actually took two passes on each eye. One with a significant increase in exposure in the eyes and the other with a lot less increase in exposure around where I placed the first brush strokes. This seemed to give a more life like result. Even after that I felt if I went much farther it didn't look real. Post processing takes forever and the result still isn't great, I really need to get better at taking the photo correctly to begin with.

[SusanH1970]

Much better now that we can see some light in his eyes.

[kristenh]

Janse, that is a great improvement. super shot!