W/NW: Model

I went to a portrait workshop today....

<p>

<center><a href="

title="Heather by blakley, on Flickr"><img

src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2349/2270202629_6f48f0db5c.jpg" width="400"

height="500" alt="Heather" /></a>

<p>

<i>M8, 50/1.4 Summilux ASPH, filter, ISO 160, DNG, studio strobes, WB: flash,

1/250@f/11, Converted and cropped in Lightroom</i></center>

i like it. very nice.

Thanks, David. Another, similar settings but with the 90/4 Macro-Elmar.

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<center><a href=" title="Zion by blakley, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2118/2270183123_f3ed76e8b1.jpg" width="400" height="500" alt="Zion" /></a></center>

On the second one I like it better with the claw like hand cropped out. First one is nice. A little softer would have been more flattering.

My Canon 85mm f2.8 nFD Soft focus excels at smoothing skin on a young woman. But of course that don't work here.

Re: the hand, she's roaring like a lion.

 

Re: smoothing skin on young women, the lily does not need gilding.

Hmm - that's the problem; the gilding is showing a bit too much.

The claw is fine.

Not sure what you're saying, Adrian, but for the record these are completely unretouched. They're not even sharpened. I converted the straight-out-of-the-camera from DNG to B&W and cropped them in Lightroom and then converted them to JPEG in Photoshop - and that's all.

Sorry that was a bit cryptic. I mean that her make-up (gilding) is a bit obvious.

 

A little softening really is essential in portraiture, if you are using lenses of this high a performance.

The make-up artist did a really good job but was aiming to color-coordinate with the model's outfit, so the effect does look pretty vivid in B&W.

 

It's of course a matter of style, but I disagree about the softening. I like my pictures of pretty girls to be sharp as a new razor.

Bob, I like the shot of Heather. And I also like my portrait shots to be razor sharp ... the 50mm Lux Asph is a great portrait lens. I'm not above a bit of spotting or retouching, but I like the detail to be there in the first place. I find if I use a softer lens to start with, I lose sharpness where I really want it, in the girl's eyes. I prefer to use a razor sharp lens that picks up that detail, and then touch out any unflattering blemishes.