I think I am improving

[cm121886]

I hoping this is a semi good portrait I have tried to use a lot of what I have learned from previous critics. So I am looking for your thoughts, I feel her face still looks really red but I feel the general exposure focus and composition are good please comment on any ways to improve.

EXIF:
Shutter: 1/30
f/1.8
ISO: 400
Shot with 50mm f/1.8
No Flash

[WooD]

She looks cold which would make her cheeks a bit red. On my monitor her skin tones look pretty natural.

Her right eye is super sharp, but viewed larger the focus falls off some, which when shooting at f/1.8 your going to get.

I'd crop the right side of the frame as close to her face as I could, and do a bit of touch up work on her skin.

[cm121886]

Thanks wood for the comments when you say touch up work on the skin what exactly would you suggest I have not had much luck trying to do skin smoothing. BTW your photos on your site are great

[WooD]

Originally Posted by cm121886

Thanks wood for the comments when you say touch up work on the skin what exactly would you suggest I have not had much luck trying to do skin smoothing. BTW your photos on your site are great

Thanks.

Hope you don't mind, and if you want I'll remove this ASAP.

I cropped it, then used the patch tool in CS2 to remove the blemishes, and the area on her chin, then I hit it just a touch with noise ninja on just her face. I masked out her eyes, and mouth.

[NicolaB]

Hi

I like Woods edit. I am all for natural though, so personally I would leave moles etc. I have just printed some of mine out with this kind of crop and they don't look fantastic :-(

In hindsight I needed to be less aggressive with my crop. I would suggest this for you. Is there room to get more of her head in and drop the eyes to the third line?

Well done on shooting at 1.8.

[cm121886]

Thanks for the comments and feel free to edit whatever you would like sometimes it is much easier to see what people are trying to explain. Here is my attempt remember this is my first time really trying skin smoothing so I still need some practice with getting that to look right. I do like that crop better seems to make the lighting more even. Thanks again

[WooD]

Originally Posted by cm121886

Thanks for the comments and feel free to edit whatever you would like sometimes it is much easier to see what people are trying to explain. Here is my attempt remember this is my first time really trying skin smoothing so I still need some practice with getting that to look right. I do like that crop better seems to make the lighting more even. Thanks again

You did good!

[Nazareth]

not sure if htis iwll work or not-- hopefully photo shows up- I think this particular photo would look good with a bit of cross processing- I'm not a big fan of altering images too much, but certain photos really look nice with htis sort of edit, and I think this one does as it cools the baCKground a bit, and accentuates the eyes nicely- also the skin tone looks nice I think- I did do a little 'model skin' filter from onone software, which keeps the defects somewhat, while just smoothign the skin a bit and keeping the pours intact- it's one of the better skin smoothers I've used- Nik 'dynamic skin smoother' filter loses too much detail I think-

I thin one slight problem with the original photo was lack of hue contrast- everythign had a warm tone to it- a bit too much- with hte background cooled, the face stands out just a bit more and has a nice contrast to the coolness of background

[Photologyst]

I like the idea of a ruddy, natural winter-sport face, but softened a bit. She has beautiful eyes so I focused on those.




You can crop as you like, but I think closer would be good eliminating some of the dark area at the left.