first test with my 1.7

<p>here are some pics I took this morning of Christy from about a 2 hour photo shoot we did. I did some retakes of the same poses as before and then added some new ones. Not sure what to think of them so you all let me know. I do like this lens.</p><div></div>

<p>christy 2</p><div></div>

<p>christy 3</p><div></div>

<p>christy 3 in color</p><div></div>

<p>christy 4</p><div></div>

<p>christy 5</p><div></div>

<p>These were all shot in RAW(DNG) I finally figured this computer thing out, not really</p>

<p>Faves: "christy 1" and "in color"...color actually has a kind of vintage-y look I like.</p>

<p>but not quite sharp ?</p>

<p>Christy 1 is a good pose but looks oof to me. Love the others.</p>

<p>Dorus, Deb - Good eyes! But I don't think it's the focus. The haziness was bothering me, too. I believe it's overexposure. The sun looks to be high and hot with the light bouncing around all over the place. On the histogram, the right side is bumping up against the edge. In PSE, I used the eyedropper in light levels to set the grey in #4. Gave it more contrast and took away the oof look.<br /> Jordan - I like your posing of Christy and I like your shots, although they just compel me to tweak by cropping (my taste - although I've changed my mind on #5).<br /> #1 This is weird, but it looks like the rail in the foreground is out of scale with Christy, almost like a trick picture. Bit of overexposure.<br /> #2 Too much distraction - move her closer to you and away from the background to throw it out of focus. again, slightly overexposed.<br /> #3 She's lit from below, you can see the shadow of her blouse on her skin. Raise the reflector and move it away to soften it.<br /> #4 my favorite - take down the exposure in post-processing or shoot earlier in the day.<br /> #5 - It's got that hazy overexposure but it looks like a newspaper photo from the '40s, sort of grows on you.<br /> I'm no expert, I've only done a few shoots and I can see errors that I've made and I'm using your shots to learn from. I used to get the overexposure haze when I would take pictures with film and it would drive me crazy because I wouldn't see it until a week later, when I got the prints back. I still get the haze, but I know what it is from and can either move me or the subject or move on. My problem is too slow shutter speeds but that's another thread.<br>

Howard<br /> Here's the tweak on Christy 4</p>

<p> </p><div></div>

<p>It looks pretty good Jordan, I think it looks like you used a PP effect on Christy1. In the GIMP it's called "softglow"... I'm not sure what the PS nomenclature is. Sometimes to get a sharp image and also have the softglow you need to layer them and make the softglow layer more opaque. It doesn't always work since it depends on the photo. <br>

As far as the photos go, they look great. The 50 1.7 looks pretty sharp on this monitor. Since this is a lens I was considering, it's helpful to know what it can do. <br>

I hope your compensating your wife and Christy in some way: They seem pretty patient during this learning process! I know that my wife has patience some days and not others, and children are patient for about 2.3 seconds. :-)</p>

<p>Very nice shots. The "F" 50mm f/1.7 is a great lens. Maybe "softglow" is a little too soft. The impression I get with some of these is that while the overall shot is very good, focus could be better. Always spot focus on an eye, hold while moving the camera again to recompose the shot. Make sure you succeed in holding that focus as you do so. Use spot AF and AF-S settings on your camera. When you are shooting using a wide aperture (aperture is not given here, but your defocussed background in most indicates at least f/3.5 or wider) your depth of field gets quite shallow, so any movement by yourself or subject will necessitate constant corrective refocussing.</p>

<p>Many of these are making nice use of a backlit situation. In such cases, however, use of a little fill flash or a relector is often a good thing to brighten darker areas a little and put some catchlight in the eyes. Seems like you did that with "in color" to good effect.</p>

<p>Howard:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>#3 She's lit from below, you can see the shadow of her blouse on her skin. Raise the reflector and move it away to soften it.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Good eye for catching that. I'm not an experienced user of reflectors, but at least in some cases (I'm thinking shoot-through umbrellas here), moving the umbrella away doesn't soften the shadows, it makes them harder as it becomes less of an wide-area source of light and more of a point source. Further away would diminish the light though so it may have the desired effect anyway. I wonder if changing the reflector angle might reduce the light without making it more of a point source?</p>

<p>Andrew - You may very well be right about distance and the reflector - smaller by virtue of distance. I'll have to play with it with my handheld reflector. Raising the reflector and having it parallel with her face or pointing downward to mimic sunlight.<br>

Jordan - Since the aperture doesn't show up in the EXIF info, could you tell us what it was? In Christy #4 the shutter speed was 1/2000 @ ISO 100. That leads me to believe your aperture was pretty wide on a really bright day which makes Michael's point above about DOF. What time of the morning was this taken? 9am? 10am? 11am? Big differences in light.<br>

Jordan -Let me say it again, I like your pictures! That's why I want to figure out how to remove the minor flaws.<br>

Howard</p>

<p>Unless I'm wrong, the light temperature looks to be midday. Obviously, the sun comes flinging down from straight above in the hours of 10am to 5 or 6pm (depending on winter or summer, of course). In my experience, this time is the WORST time of day to shoot portraits. I guess you put your model in some shade, which helped, but do yourself a huge favor and shoot in the cool light of morning, or the intense yellow and orange of the "golden hour."<br /> -HG<br /> http://photong.org</p>

<p>#3 works much better in B&W. The composition draws your eyes in there, but the color version pulls your eyes about.</p>

 

<p>I was not going to comment, because frankly I have not been feeling well....but I will say this.<br>

I believe you took a step backwards here Jordan. The last two images you posted where quite good, infact excellent ''imo''...Now this is good news because you are reaching that point. These are back to looking out of focus and overly soft...</p>

<p>Christy 1 is composed well, but you need to focus on the eyes.<br>

Christy 2 look pretty good to me with my new glasses :) A tad overexposed, but I am nit picking.</p>

<p>Christy 3 and 4 look pretty good also, but I don't like the crop. You cut her breast in half. Try it lower or higher and see what you get.</p>

<p>Christy 4 looks good and I like Howards edit.</p>

<p>Christy 5 has chopped limbs...</p>

<p>All in all there is a huge improvement. You are learning fast</p>

<p>ok I have done a couple of them over. 1st pic and the cropof her face and chest. I would never intentionally cut someones breast in half Lol javier. anyways here they are. the first one all I did is change to black and white and touch red, yellow a little for skin tone. 2nd I put her breast back together in the pic and recropped</p><div></div>

<p>recrop</p><div></div>

<p>these images were shot between 8:00 and 10:00 am</p>

<p>Ok Jordan, let's try this: If it's humid out, the light is going to be bouncing around. Even at 10am, in the summer, the light can be pretty strong. I notice that the sky is mostly blown out when you can see it.<br>

Next time try a polarizing filter. It will cut the glare and the haziness. Your aperture will open a stop or so, so slow your shutter speed down from 1/2000 so you can have an aperture of at least 3.5 so you will have enough depth of field. 1/500 will stop all motion, if your concerned about that. With Christy standing still, 1/250th should cover it.<br>

Make sure her eye are really in focus.<br>

On with the adventure!<br>

Howard</p>

<p>The one thing is I am centering the focus on the eyes. Is there a trick to the focus set up on improving this matter. I am using center weighted</p>

<p>Jordan, I was wondering if you are setting the aperture via aperture ring or if the aperture ring is left on 'A'? With your new 'F' 50/1.7 lens you can leave aperture ring on 'A' and set the aperture in 1/3 or 1/2 stops via the rear e-dial, no stop-down metering required. You can even use the 16-segment metering rather than center-weighted. I only ask because the aperture isn't appearing in the EXIF for the posted images, and it appears that center-weighted metering is in use.</p>

<p>As for sharp focus; I assume you mean you're using only the center AF point. A few thoughts--is autofocus adjustment required for that lens+body pair? Also, if you're shooting wide open or close to wide open, then you have very little depth-of-field to work with, so movement after AF lock when you re-compose might throw off your focus.</p>

<p>Jordon,<br>

Lighting is greatly improved. it looks like you're using a reflector or fill flash on some and then nothing on others (christy 3 vs christy recrop) - no sparkle in eyes. You should look at previous posts and see how much you have progressed.</p>