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Nice portrait . I like the soft light on her face but I wish the shadow on her nose would have been brighter a bit, outlining better that part of her face.I like the inner thoughts she seems to be in, and the B/W choice.

beautiful light i also like the beauty of the skin.

the eye and lips looks inocent(beautiful)

DOF work for me but most of all the expresion of her face

make me love this photo.

the nose is the only problem here...anything elses

looks fine to me !!

congratulation for POW

Unasual and nice portrait:-))

...but as mentioned, I also find the shadow on the nouse to strong.

Could be lightened up with the "shadows/highlight" tool in Photoshop SC2, I'm sure it would

still improve the image.

 

Best regards,

Ben

http://www.csun.edu/~rhs12626/penn_photos/pages/man_jpg.htm

 

http://www.csun.edu/~rhs12626/penn_photos/pages/picasso_jpg.htm

 

http://www.csun.edu/~rhs12626/penn_photos/pages/barnett_jpg.htm

 

So, what's so wrong about deep shadows on these faces ? Or what makes this POW's shadow less acceptable than the shadows in any of the above linked pictures ?

 

And I'm adding here another picture by Irving Penn where people could both complain about blown highlights AND blacked out shadows. This portrait by Irving Penn is nevertheless one of the very few portraits out there, which I could hang in my room and look at for ever. Note how much emphasis goes to that eye...

Great portrait. I love the light and the B & W.

Marc G.: Good question. I'll take a stab at an answer. The human face is symmetrical, so seeing half a face allows us to interpolate what the whole face looks like. In the photos you've posted, the shadows on the faces leave a full half of each face unobstructed (in one, part of the face is hidden behind a jacket collar, but that's another matter altogether). The shadow of the nose in the POW, however, covers a good portion of the only visible side of the subject's face, leaving us no information to finish our mental picture of what her full face looks like. Plus, I suspect the shadow does make her nose look larger than it really is, which is generally unflattering (and I speak with the authority of a guy with a really big nose).

For me, it is simple. This woman is beautiful. She has a large but not ugly nose. The photographer, consciously or not, chose to shoot the woman with her head tilted downwards and with a darkly shadowed nose - this gave the nose MORE weight. She is still beautiful. Take care! Glenn

The photo of Irving Penn is indeed very beautiful because it directs our attention to the eye. The means here are the blown out parts of the face and the deep black areas. This weeks POW has not succeeded the same, because the shadow on the nose draws the attention at the expense of the eye. I would have expected that also Marc can see this difference in overall quality between the POW and the Penn photo.

"I would have expected that also Marc can see this difference in overall quality between the POW and the Penn photo".

 

I think I DO see it. I used these examples just to make a point.

All 4 Irving Penn photos are lit very differently from the POW photo. I think they are all good examples of how to minimize the prominanace of distinctively shaped noses. The POW's lighting accentuates the large nose and detracts attention from the only meaningful part of the photo, the eye.

A little unfair to bring the Penn portrait into this forum : the present image suffers by comparison. There's a problem with the present portrait that I have been trying to articulate since I first saw it. The trouble as I see it is that the lady's personality reveals itself in spite of the treatment, instead of being revealed by it. It strikes me that the treatment is too heavy and ponderous to do justice to the sitter. This set-up might have been OK for a strong masculine portrait, but certainly not for this lady.

All that is said about the harsh shadow on the nose seems very reasonable to me. Yet I think without the shadow this photo would never be the POW. Without the harsh lighting the portrait is no different from very usual profile photos. What makes this a 'deviant' one is the harsh lighting and the deep shadows on the face.

Look at the picture not the detail.

Stefan:

 

"Close" meaning shut? or "Close" meaning nearness? For me, each would evoke a different way of looking at the image.

 

I cannot tell how much time you had in order to compose, then shoot this image in your viewfinder. If it's posed, good. If it's not posed, even better. What matters to me is that a personality come across. You've succeeded in that part.

 

I don't agree that the shadow makes the nose look big. It tells me how much of an angle the light source was in relation to the front of her face. This type of lighting can be considered "modified Rembrandt." A modification of the historical lighting technique used by Rembrandt in his portrait paintings. In your image it's used at a different camera angle than you'd typical see in Rembrandt's paintings as well as portrait studios (hence "modified Rembrandt")

 

The catch light in her eye is not easy to identify. It's seems to be coming from a window off to the side. I get the idea her attention is clearly focused on something (therefore not posed). I see a surface reflection in the bottom of her eye that gives me the idea she's in the act of looking at something.

 

It's about the face. Being that close in proximity to her, I would assume that she is of "close" relation to you. I'm not sure it matter's whether or not she is. Just that it feels that way to me.

 

There's a great deal of texture that I like here. Her hair framing her face, wrinkles of her bottom lip, peach fuzz under her nose, differing textures of the skin all brought together here by you.

 

Regards,

This photo is technically excellent; the details are pin-sharp and the lighting is very nice. However it didn't "do anything" for me in terms of stirring emotion or conveying a mood. I like portraits that tell me something about the subject. It would be good to see something like this from you because I like your techniques; maybe even of the same girl but at least so we can see all of her face.

I agree with Ken Nelson's comments about Rembrandt like lighting. I thought the same when I first saw this. What is unique is that I think that it evokes different responses depending on the viewer. It's like one of those drawings where half the people see object X and the other half see object Y. I think it depends on whether you see light in the dark or dark in the light. The former are drawn immediately to the eyes and mouth and become engaged with her gaze. The others see the forms of the various planes of her face made more prominent by the deep shadows. It's an interesting portrait and interesting study on the effects of lighting.

This photo works for me. Immediately & intensely evocative. The personification of contemplation, and that eye... a person could lose their soul in there.

Great light job... may be i like a bit more light reflecting thru the eyes and a little less shadows on the nose as many people says here...Congrats!6/6

The conversation is over. I had to restrain myself. If this had been a photo of a man I doubt all the discussion would have been about the nose. I looked at this portrait many times over the course of a few days and never once thought the apparent size of her nose was an issue.

Here at photo.net, there is a photographic allergy to shadows in portraits. I was particularly disappointed by the comment that the entire side of a face needed to be visible for us to understand the structure of a face, as if a portrait's reason to exist were to inform us about the height of a cheek or the size of a nose. How limiting, how sad and how stereotypically photo.net that concept is... t

Lovely portrait.

Do you share models with Skip Hansen (who also currently has a photograph of the week), or is this just an amazing coincidence?

There is a "rule" that no more than 10% of the photo should be shadowless black. Without seeing a shot with more details in the blacks, it would be hard to tell if it would be better. But, in my opinion, this is very, very well done.

I do not agree with those who see this as a flawed portrait due to the deep shadow. I think this deep shadow on the face breaks it up and momentarily jars us out of an automatic way of seeing a face. The shadow leaves us her eye and her profile, her hair and cheek. At the same time, the shadow itself is a curved and attractive shape - an abstract element.

Ever see Picasso's cubist period portraits? With the nose curving in towards the face?

I think this is a compelling work because it is not just another "perfect" portrait, rather it causes us to see freshly something as common as a face.

Well done, IMO.

It is indeed astonishing shot...excellent arrangement for the light source, and the angle reveals such good amount of light and shade, which the artist achieved his goal of enhancing the features of the girls' profile

While I understand the reason why the majority of responses concentrate on the technical, the photo has strong emotional appeal. I feel it would be wrong for the entire photo to be in perfect, crisp focus. There is great beauty to be found in this work. Incidentally, in the dramatic use of shadow I am reminded of Orson Wells and his wonderful movie "Citizen Kane" which relies on dramatic lighting for much of its dramatic effect. This portrait touches the heart as much as the mind.

The angle of the face profile is not coordinated with the direction the eyes are looking. Aside

from that opinion, the portrait is very striking and attracts the viewer immediately and to me

that is positive. But I would like the model to be either looking down diagonally from the

angle of the face, or looing up towards the ceiling somewhat more.