dont loose it...

Lovely and haunting image. Beautiful work ... thanks for sharing it. BD

Very lovely photo is a fine job!

Outstanding.

Wonderful image! I admire your skills.

Best regards Peter

Excellent 7/7 ;-)

another great one! Fabulous.

What a charming little portrait. I love the way the dress seems to evolve from the background, which, by the way, is a critical component of the photo's mood. The background, I mean. Replace it (the background) with any other, and you've completely changed the tone of the photograph. The lighting is nice, matching the innocence of the subject. I love the pose and the Victorian feel the pose and the styling give.

 

A couple of small issues: The lock of hair between her cheek and ear that distracts me a little, and her hands, which seem a little too large for a girl her age. Perhaps the lens was both too short in focal length, and then too close. A longer focal length, further back would have helped with this, I think. The lens height is fine and makes her look a little bit grown up, but of course, we know she's not, which makes the photo more interesting to view.

 

That's all from a photographer's point of view. From a client's point of view, if this were my child, I would totally love this portrait. It makes her look so elegant and refined. Beautiful work.

A beautiful, but somber portrait. When I looked at some of your massive number of images in your portfolio, I noted that nearly all of the people you shoot have that same somber expression--even the children at play. Not a bad thing, but makes me wonder about you. Are you really that sad? I think not. Just your style, probably. Most of my feelings are already expressed by Doug B. above. Especially about the hands. Does she bite her nails? It might be better to hide her hands in shadow in other works. You could crop off this image at where the hands begin, but would lose that nice shadow at the lower part of the picture.

 

Overall, I like the photo and wish I could do half as well. And my congratulations on being this week's subject for critique.

 

Willie the Cropper

she is beautiful

love the mood

 

i am wondering how old she is?

and how did you pick the name for your photo?

chosing one of Gundega Deges's photos as POW was long overdue. her images of her daughter (?) reveal an insight into another aspect of childhood, that many (better: most) overlook, or tend to forget. it seems as if she read her Kierkegaard well. fear, angst, uncertainty, these are some of the aspects i can see in many of her child pictures. and these parts are forgotten about, when childhood is praised as a time of unburdened living.

congratulations on a well earned POW.

thanks every body! Linda is my daughter, she was 9 years on the picture!

I particularly like the use of the typical props of the Victorian portrait where children were often represented not as children per se but as adults in miniature. This combined with the fairytale 'child lost in a forest' background adds to the unsettling feeling of childhood under threat. She is a beautiful child, but also, I suspect, an actress and model for her mother's message in these photos. The sombre and unsettling mood here is, I think, well supported by her unnervingly unswerving gaze, the prominence of the hands with their bitten fingernails, making it much more than just a pretty portrait in the Victorian style. I agree with Florian, Kierkegaard sounds about right.

PS. That's a bandage on the heart she is holding, not a ribbon, so I disagree with Doug Burgess and Bill Tate here: this is not a portrait that is meant to be prettied up.

 

I think it looks amazing technically. One tiny thing only - the background visible between her elbow and body seems to me just little bit lighter than the rest of the background and a slightly different texture.

 

PPS. Sorry, Linda, I notice I was wrong - you don't bite your nails.

oh i think its ok with her nails, its a little bit from nail polish :)

ok , i will give you a little story behind this, look also the rest of the folder i will protect you, ok here it is

 

This is our world, full of pain, suffering, wars and all the rest. A little angel tries to save it all; it is our angel, our hopes and dreams for a better world.

 

I come back to these series over and over because I have moments in my life when I need to see them. Sometimes people say they are crying when they look at them. I think I have put much of myself in them, as well as my daughter Linda who is the main model of my angel images.

The model's sleeves may have cutout artifact and the lower parts of the dress seems to come out of the background perhaps due to the soft ps blending imposed.

 

Or have you been messing about with the background and where this comes into contact with the model you get the artefacts.

 

Dunno what is happening in the background between heart and left arm - it may be just an unlucky fall of the background and seems brighter since it is surrounded by dark borders.

 

The real image is in the face, heart and hands. There is a massive amount of extraneous background diluting the picture.

 

For personal taste - this style is even better if the photo looks much poorer in quality, so matching the mood etc. For example previous POW Waiting for the Fruits by Dariusz Kilmczak Jan 15 2007

 

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00JWsd

 

 

This weeks photo is photographically just too good. - sorry about that. The quality of the image is too sharp and clear to match the presumed mood that is meant to be portrayed. This leaves my eye exploring the picture for more detail instead of relaxing myself physically into the overall mood.

 

 

High quality photo, that does not quite get over the line for me as a work of art.

Kezia, you are right. What a dunce I am! I looked through Gundega's folder before commenting, and saw all her work, that it was more illustration than portrait, yet somehow I fell into a perception of it as a portrait, thanks to the background, I think. Thanks for pointing this out.

 

To John Marsden, I wonder if the artifacts you're seeing aren't a result of jpg compression? Or from dodging? I notice that what I thought was veil, or thin material, on her left (our right,) is actually a tree trunk, but I do see some softness on the lower right of the dress.

 

To both John and Kezia, that bright part between the heart and her left arm, it's actually the exact same brightness as the background to the left of that same arm, (I measured it), so John is right, it appears brighter because of being surrounded by darker tones. A bolt of local burning would fix that.

This is a magnificent photo, Gundega. I don't know how I missed your work before. You are now listed among my "most interesting." That expression is timeless, and the use of the bandaged heart is a masterful stroke.

 

--Lannie

I accept now that the patch beside her elbow is the same value as the area you point to. However, shouldn't the darker tree trunk values that you point to below her elbow logically continue up behind her arm? I also prefer how in Gundega's version the tree branch on the right is anchored to the small piece of trunk that is visible rather than floating as it is in your crop. I also think that darker area of trunk at the edge behind her, even though quite small, frames the picture, defining the edge and giving it a better balance.

Sorry, Doug, I forgot to say that I'm referring to your version in my comments.

Kezia, indeed, you are right: the darker tree trunk should continue up and be visible through her arm! I can't explain why this is not so. Looking at it some more, there appears to be a shadow horizontally across the bottom of the backdrop, which is putting the dark in the darker tree part that we're talking about. Should the tree trunk be this lighter value all around? Something doesn't make sense.

 

The branch at the top, right; yes, you're right about that. It frames the image, and when removed, the remaining branch seems to hang from nothing. They're both distracting to me and now I don't like it either way. (Am I allowed to be wishy-washy?) Perhaps she is too close to the background for my taste? Maybe what I would like to see the background softer? If she stepped away from it, and the lens used was longer, wouldn't that work? Overall, I think the background adds a lot to the overall effect. It may be distracting, as John thinks, but it does add flavor.

 

Even so, at least we're nitpicking the background, and not the main subject.

Actually, I like the mix of the young girl, with a slightly sad expression, wearing black, and the (unintentional?) typo in the title. 'Don't lose it' vs. 'Don't loose it' (don't release it). This creates a really interesting dichotomy of meanings for me.

wonderful work, beatiful light, congratulations

Very nicely done...reminds me a lot like the photographs of children by Loretta Lux -- are you familiar with her?

 

Is "don't lose it" the official "title" of this photo?

Cold and impersonal. Lacks depth.