My 1st photoshoot. let me know what you think.

<p>hi everyone, i just bought a canon 450d and a 50mm f1.8 lens. after owning the camera for only three weeks this is my first photoshoot. let me know what you think of the pictures. i have been told, by somewhat of a mentor, that these are incredible for a three week old beginner :) let me know what you think.ANY feedback and critisizm appreciated.cheers, ryan</p>

<div></div>

<p>pic number two</p><div></div>

<p>pic number three</p><div></div>

<p>pic number four</p><div></div>

<p>pic number five</p>

<p>wont let me upload more, but ya get the jist of it :)</p>

<p>What are you looking for? If you want your pics rated and/or critiqued, you can upload them to photo.net and request a critique.</p>

<p>Assuming that you are a three-week old beginner, the pics are very good. I don't really buy it though. I feel as though this thread is somewhat just fishing for compliments. You don't sound like a beginner in the way you describe or present your shots.</p>

<p>im honest to god a beginner. never studied photography.. i have a modelling background, and apart from that sat there testing every iso and aperture setting i possibly could and reading through photography magazines.and thats my experience. i research a fair bit on lenses and cameras and all that stuff, but other than that i just take the pictures and the settings i desire.<br>

im not fishing for compliments, i work at a factory with an "ex" professional photographer who thinks highly of my pictures..the basis of this post was for everyday photographers, beginners, professionals and whoever can give me advice on where to improve..<br>

cheers</p>

 

<p>p.s im new to this site, signed up last week so i was unaware of critiques.</p>

 

<p>From the "About This Forum" description (a couple of inches under the link you click to post a thread):</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>Picture posts are acceptable, although this not a "No Words" forum. Critique request posts belong in the Critique Forum. Pictures posted here should be solely for discussing specific techniques/issues.</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>In other words, this isn't the place for "Look at these! What do you think?" posts. There should be specific issues you're looking for feedback on.</p>

<p>like i said im new.therefore my experience on these forums isnt much.<br>

and also like i said i wasnt aware of critique forums or pages. but in my defence im after feedback regarding the images presented from ANY form of photographer, not just critiques which would have some sort of judging experience professionally.<br>

im a beginner, was hoping to put up pics, and get feedback from everyday ppl in regards to those..and by that i mean, "u should do this, next time try this, have u thought of doing.....and so on"</p>

<p>Images submitted to the Critique forum do get comments from "any form of photographer;" there's no professional judging experience required to offer critiques there.</p>

<p>One of the best ways to improve is to develop your skills at self critique. Putting serious thought into carefully examining your own images and thinking "what could I have done better?" will help you more that just posting images and hoping for random feedback. In addition, you're more likely to get detailed critiques from others when you demonstrate that you are giving serious thought to improving your images.</p>

<p>Whether you're in the right place or not, these are great shots.</p>

<p>Ryan,</p>

<p>If I see your work in the portrait category for critiques, I will try to give you a detailed critique (or you can Email me and ask for one). Overall, I'd say you have done very well. The poses are good, the composition is mostly very good, her skin tone (except for the over exposed shot) is good. Of course, it never hurts to be able to shoot a pretty girl.</p>

<p>I hope to be seeing more from you in the portrait category. Good start.</p>

<p>Mark</p>

<p>Hey Ryan -</p>

<p>Please don't take this the wrong way, but I'd be careful about sounding overconfident when speaking about your work; I believe the humble approach is always best. People tend to be put off by any form of arrogance (even mentioning that someone thinks your work is incredible). While I feel these are good photos, there is definitely room for improvement. Here are some of my thoughts:</p>

<p>I enjoy the model's poses in all but the third image, which looks slightly unnatural to me. You've found a good subject with her, but some different looks would also be nice. Capturing various expressions is something I'm needing to work on in my photography as well. The exposure in the first image looks good, but images three and four appear just a little too dark; I'd bump up the mid-tones / highlights just a bit. Pay particular attention to the light in the eyes. I'm not at all enjoying the overexposure on image two. If you want to go high-key I'd suggest achieving it without tons of blown out detail. I don't feel like the environment in image two is right for the effect. The focus seems slightly off in image one; the tree behind her and to the right appears sharp, but her face looks a little soft (it's easy for this to happen at f/1.8). Are you working with reflectors at all? I'd definitely recommend them as a next step...to aid with controlling and finding more light in your images. Lastly, your compositions look good, but watch out for overusing "the tilt".</p>

<p>I hope that some of my feedback here helps.</p>

<p>Brad </p>

<p>Ryan - Brad had a great point. In image one, the focus in on the tree. When shooting at f1.8, you have such a narrow depth of field that you have to make sure your focus is set to the subjects eye. I have done a lot of indoor shooting at f1.4 and f1.8, and I find that even if the focus is on the nose, your image can be a little soft.</p>

<p>Of course, all is not lost. You can always work on increasing the sharpness in photoshop/a RAW image processor using a variety of techniques (smart sharpen, a sharpen brush, high-pass filter, etc).</p>

<p>Also, when shooting outside, I would consider increasing the aperture just a little. I don't really see why you would need to shoot f1.8 outdoors unless it is very low light or you want a ton of boca.</p>

<p>As for a couple of other things, tilting can be a great effect, but it looks almost like your subject is falling in image four. In image three, the arms don't seem to flow...the pose looks very forced. You might want to give your subject a little freedom. I have found that my daughter will pose much better than I can ever pose her and give great, natural expressions because she feels comfortable.</p>

<p>The second one is way too washed out for my tastes but the rest of them are very good. I find the tilt on the last one to be too extreme, however. The first one is clearly the best in my opinion.</p>

<p>However, as has already been mentioned, these belong in the critique forum, not here. And as a hint, you can include several photos in the same thread buy uploading them to a site like Photobucket and just insert the HTML code with an added <br><br> between them to put a space in between.</p>

<p>hey everyone thank you very much for the feedback.<br />ive definately taken it all on board, and will surely play around with different apertures to insure the correct depth of field is applied for each image, because i can definately see the softer parts of the photo, against the sharper backgrounds. i just got a copy of photoshop so i will play around with that also to see what image i can produce.<br>

if i was to critique my photos at this stage id say image one is my favourite of the four, needs a bit of sharpening in the face, but even if i cant get that effect i dont mind the slightly soft look as it draws attention to the face.<br>

image two, could go with a contrast adjustment :)<br>

image three the pose seems a little unnatural, the arms are extended too high above the head that it looks like she is hanging by the arms.<br>

image four im actually quite happy with how this one turned out, as far as quality goes. also the model looks comfortable. but yeh with the tilt used i can see how it looks like she is sliding down a mountain :)<br>

p.s the model didnt smile because she has braces and it was at her request.<br /><br />again, thank you for the feedback</p>

<p>is there any way i can more accurately "aim" the focus. majority of these where shot at auto focus, bar the fourth one, which was manual, and it still seems a little soft.<br>

would increasing the iso, aperture, changing it to spot metering much make of a difference?<br>

im thinking of shooting my next outdoor portraits at f2.8-f6.0, at iso 400 with spot metering</p>

<p>My instructor once told me, "always shoot pretty people when you want someone to notice your work". Very pretty girl, nice shots all except for the over exposed shot.</p>

<p>She is very beautiful, and has very pretty brown eyes. Use a reflector and get some light in them to accent their color and give you a little more lighting control. With eyes like that some head shots are in order too. Good work!</p>

<p>Ryan (Chase),</p>

<p>I am curious...you state that you are a beginner, and I do believe that you are based on the posts that followed your photos. I will say that I think you have an eye for photography, but in my opinion I think the first photo is the best and most natural looking shot. The other poses look a bit forced and aren't really my taste. (Personal opinion)</p>

<p>As for the technical aspects of your photography, I do have some questions...</p>

<p>Curiosity begs me to ask how many shots you took to get the 4 photos you posted? </p>

<p>I'm also curious why, in the first shot, you shot at f/1.8 and used flash unless you were trying to get better bokeh. <br>

I'd suggest you try shooting at f/5.6 or f/8 when you use flash to get the model's whole face in focus.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>that shoot i took 24 photos, each of the ones posted wer taken only once, and have been posted as taken with the exception of the over exposed one. i used flash to give the tree some more detail and some shadows around the base of the tree. i figured the flash would also draw more attention to the models face as it would stand out more due to an increase in brightness in that particular area. to be honest the entire shoot except a few pictures were shot around f1.8-f3.0 because i believe i needed, and still need practice on desireable bokeh effects, and also need more practice on variations of depth of field.<br />i dont own reflectors and because the weather on the day didnt decide to bring my tripod, so when i encountered low light environments i found myself shooting fast with flash.</p>

<p>Hi Ryan,<br>

This is amazing! I'm also a beginner, but I'm amazed by your technique! Keep it up!</p>

<p>mmmm well when i was a beginner i was also keen to show just how fast i was catching on, but it depends what you want. I want to make a good living off this, so in the end for me the only thing worth looking at is "how good" as opposed to "how good given its only been a short time". Those 3 weeks will very quickly be 1 year by which time being a talented beginner doesnt really buy you much credit.</p>

<p>The quality of these shots depends on many things. I quite like some of the angles, the lighting is flat, the model looks like she give good looks which makes your job easier. Being able to do some post processing doesnt suddenly make shots good, which isnt saying its a bad shot. Personally i think the angles on the fourth one are quite nice but photographers rarely agree. Like Brad says, I would be very careful about anything that sounds like tooting your own horn, its just begging for someone to come along and tear every last detail in every shot to pieces, and remember that there are many fantastic, highly successful photographers looking at these forums. Its nice to get some positive feedback, especially early on, but be ready for some harsh feedback too! So my advice is to stick your critique requests in the appropriate forum, not tell anyone that people think your shots are great unless you are taking genuinely jawdropping shots (and even then..), and to find the best shots on the site that you want to shoot like, and work out how they were done, and learn from the masters.</p>