First Solo Shoot

[brandonwarren]

Hello everyone, I am fairly new to DPS. Attached is a photo from my first solo shoot ever. I had a friend come along to a few places I had been eyeing for quite some time. I would appreciate any and all opinions! You can see the rest of the pictures as a set on my flickr account.

Camera: Nikon D300
Exposure: 0.05 sec (1/20)
Aperture: f/5
Focal Length: 82 mm
ISO Speed: 200
Exposure Bias: 0/6 EV
Exposure Program: Normal

[SJH Foto]

I do like the window motif! It may have worked better though if it was framing her, and not bisecting her, but I personally think it's very nice. Her eyes naturally make me want to follow her field of vision and see what she's looking at, so the shot does hold a person's interest!

[brandonwarren]

Thanks! This was in an old shed with the crank style windows.. I played with different angles and frames and even eye contact.. looking back through, this photo was the most interesting to me..

[imagesbyjk]

I like it. I'd like to see the other versions. My first impulse was that this looked a little posed and I would like it to seem more candid by having her looking out the window (which would be more natural for her to do).

[wulf]

Here are some quick sketches.



Firstly, I spotted something odd in the picture, which I circled in the one on the left. What was that? It is probably better without it.

Next, I sketched in a "rule of thirds" grid. It is far from essential that every picture fits the grid but this one doesn't really link in at all. Thirdly, I show a possible alternative. I have cropped to a 3:4 format. The resulting composition brings you much closer to the model while still retaining enough of the window to raise the questions of what it is and why it stands between you and her. It also makes her less centered in the result, with her right eye roughly at the top left grid point, a diagonal line from the crown of her head down to the bottom right corner and a shorter diagonal bisecting the central grid square.

It is by no means the only possible crop but worth considering... and it gets rid of that mysterious object I circled in the first sketch!

Wulf

[imagesbyjk]

Ordinarily I would say Wulf's advice is good. I avoid centering when possible. But in this instance I think his crops eliminate too much of the window and we lose perspective of what we're seeing. I would be in favor of moving the model more to the left to achieve some of Wulf's objectives.

All of which makes me realize an interesting phenomenon, a lot of the cc's I'm seeing these days address post production work and cropping you can do to salvage an image rather than addressing what could have been done during initial capture. Maybe its the difference between learning in the film age vs the digital age. I think there are things to be learned via the post production approach. My philosophy is - get it right when you shoot it and spend post production time making it sing rather than trying to fix it.

[brandonwarren]

imagesbyjk - here is a version of her looking out the window. i honestly have been trying to limit my post production work. i just don't know if eliminating' it will ever be a possibility! thanks so much!

wulf - this is the kind of thing i need to be hearing, very constructive criticism, and very much appreciated! the mysterious object in the image is grass.. which i have included a picture for reference. thanks!

Link:
sidebyside: http://www.flickr.com/photos/15936280@N02/2671070299/

Content:




Shared with Flock - The Social Web Browser
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[imagesbyjk]

Originally Posted by brandonwarren

imagesbyjk - here is a version of her looking out the window. i honestly have been trying to limit my post production work. i just don't know if eliminating' it will ever be a possibility! thanks so much!

wulf - this is the kind of thing i need to be hearing, very constructive criticism, and very much appreciated! the mysterious object in the image is grass.. which i have included a picture for reference. thanks!

Link:
sidebyside: http://www.flickr.com/photos/15936280@N02/2671070299/

Content:




Shared with Flock - The Social Web Browser
http://flock.com

I like that. I had envisioned her looking more downward but this works.

You can't, nor should you, eliminate pp work. Capturing the image is only half the job. Bringing it to life in PS is the other half. Its just that you don't want to spend your PS time fixing an image. You want be polishing it and making it shine.

[prince]

Those are some good tips to learn from. Thanks everyone for sharing your learnings

[SJH Foto]

Originally Posted by imagesbyjk

Ordinarily I would say Wulf's advice is good. I avoid centering when possible. But in this instance I think his crops eliminate too much of the window and we lose perspective of what we're seeing. I would be in favor of moving the model more to the left to achieve some of Wulf's objectives.

All of which makes me realize an interesting phenomenon, a lot of the cc's I'm seeing these days address post production work and cropping you can do to salvage an image rather than addressing what could have been done during initial capture. Maybe its the difference between learning in the film age vs the digital age. I think there are things to be learned via the post production approach. My philosophy is - get it right when you shoot it and spend post production time making it sing rather than trying to fix it.

I agree to a point. PP work is good, and it's always good to understand how to do it, but in-camera settings need to be addressed much more often than they are in my humble opinion.