creative portraits A session with Erika. Makeup by Domenico Sanna (smallstudio). We were in Ostia Lido at the sea, 30 km from Rome. It was winter.

A shooting with Erika during this winter...

Eolo,

 

This is BEATIFUL! I like the combination of both photos very much. Great Work!

I like the left shot much better than the right, but no doubt it's good work. I don't really see the necessity or the point to have both shots together, by the way... More difficult to critique as well. Regards.

Eolo, I do respect your work very much (one of my favourites is the one of the girl with a glass of wine sitting on a deck and looking up to the camera); however, I don't understand and don't feel the message of these two shots here.

excellent contrasts. I'd like to believe she really is a violinist. the 'peek' pose is very effective.

Eolo, I have visited your web site many times before and really like your work. Creative and technically well done. I like the way that you have put Erika's images together here - though what happen to her feet/bottom of her skirt in the image on the right? I would have liked to see them included in the image.

these too images are so well executed that I would have a hard time believingthat you were not a pro. As for the critique, little to say other than I don't understand the message which by the way makes the image even more attractive and mysterious.

The violin added to the girl's hand in the left picture would make it more "melodious" in its mood and "moving" in its lines, there also would be some kind of hidden passion then. Very professional pictures. Bravo.

Two Pows at once, congratulations.

elfs shall we comment both or can we choose.

Musician, is she really a musician?

Congrats Eolo (at last an Italian PoW :-). We would like to know as much as possibile about this photo: technique, studio settings, if she's a model or a real musician, and so on...

Musician, is she really a musician?

 

Unfortunately, she's holding the violin like it was a gun, and the violin doesn't even have a bridge attached to it! To any actual musician (especially string players), the pose and set-up look obviously artificial.

 

I've always admired Eolo's work. This is a very lovely set of glamour photos. I don't really "get" the connection between the two, however. In the left photo, the woman is shy, playful, and intriguing. This photo would stand well all by itself. In the right photo, the woman looks like she doesn't know what to do with the instrument--as if it just fell out of the sky.

The juxtaposition of the two photographs doesnt work for me. The photograph on the left is very good on its own, but the photo on the right seems impersonal, gimmicky, and too distant for my taste. One reason I find the beach photo disconcerting is because it is the violin, not Erikas face, that is sharply in focus. Also, I find Erikas eye in the photo on the right to be an unappealing smudge of white.

 

The photo on left is not without a flaw too. The white shirt on Erika is too indistinct from the background. A slightly darker background would have improved the photograph.

 

 

I forgot to say why I wish to know all that stuff about the photo. While the photo is definitely good both from the aestetical and technical points of view, the "love for music" cited by the elves could be an inappropriate comment if the model is just a model and not a musician (I mean if the violin shot is just a pose).

 

PS Anyway Eolo is definitely talented as a fashion photographer. I suggest other members to take a look to Eolo's portfolio and personal website.

Well, me too don't like the way how model hold violine. For me it is not natural. And second critic is the way where model look on right picture. It looks like old Soviet comunist portraits of workers looking in bright future...

One small trick I learned from old master: If you want subject to look somwhere else, not in camera and subject-photographer distance is let say 3 meters, then subject should to look at something which is 3 metres distance from photographer.

Left photo I find nice. And both are well executed regarding picture taking and darkroom work, at least for me.

Una splendida foto :)

Complimenti, quella di sx in particolare e' splendida.

Beautiful execution.

Technically almost perfect photos, particularly the right one, painting like by excellent lighting.

However, I don't care for the idea showing two or more pictures at the same time in order to tell a story. Besides, I don't see "love for music" in these shots, at least not by seeing how the violin was held.

The violin position was the reason for which I asked if the model is a real musician: I don't think so. In facts a violin player would never hold a violing like that. From this point of view, frankly speaking, the 'passion for music' comment is not adequate.

 

Apart from this detail I would say that everything else is nearly perfect: exposure, framing, lighting. Congratulations again.

Very beautiful, although I think they would be better separated. I also don't get the connection between both pictures and don't agree with the POW caption. Maybe she isn't a musician at all (as some users have pointed). But anyway, the aesthetics please me a lot.

The photo on the right is more surreal "Don't let that horse eat that violin!" cried Chagall's wife... (L.F.) than narrative, and certainly says nothing about a passion for anything except really good make up and styling (except for the missing bridge on the violin, which would actually contribute to the images claim to surreality (?), had one been made... I ramble.

Indeed, as Jeannie G said, the violin looks as if it fell from the sky. A frying pan and spatula would make better sense, given her hand positions. Then we could argue about a passion for cooking! (Is she a cook?) The woman on the left could be fearful for the fate of the flying, frying eggs that are air born, out of the (right) frame... t

Actually this is not too off the mark for the absurdity of modern fashion imagery. Anybody see the Zoolander/Stiller spread in Vanity Fair by A. Leibowitz? Put some antlers on that girl!

The picture on the left is fine, though vacuous. On the right, the balance is off, as if the model were looking for some cosmic type to be set in the sky, explaining her "raison d'etre"... t

this is all sour grapes, really. I wish I had such capable assistants available to me for all my imagined and real projects. You all do good work.

I like this pic, it's witty, fey and funny. It's NOT about emotion, passion, love of music, etc. etc., Whether the woman really is a musician or not, I doubt the picture is meant to express that - the dress and instrument have more the feel of surrealist props, as others have said.

moderator edit of one sentance unrelated to the image

-just because a person holds a violin for a photo doesn't make them a musician. just because a person holds a violin for a photo doesn't mean the subject has a love of music.

-seems to me, the elves are projecting here.

 

what do you see in the rorschach inkblot?

 

I see a woman (although it could be a man in drag) who is expressing her love of her left hand, and her fondness for tossing violins off hillsides.

 

-the photos themelves look fine.

 

 

 

Did you print these in a traditional darkroom? If so, what paper did you use?

 

My only criticism is the lack of contrast in both pictures. In the right hand one, I only make out the woman's right shoulder down to her elbow after stairing for a minute. The image would be stronger if the model's body were visually diferentiated from the background. The same applies for the lefthand picture. The model's left shoulder(one we can see - sorta!) totally blends into the background. This can easily be corrected by printing at a higher contrast; or, with more difficulty, carefully burning the problem areas.

 

 

These are very good photos. Just have to ask: Who really believes she is a musician? The first photo I love. The second she seems to be performing a act of hara-kiri with the violin and bow. Being taught the violin in my youth and growing up with a grandfather that was a classically taught violinist, this second scene would never have occured with anyone that loved their art or instrument. (where is the bridge on the violin?) Sorry it seems you have projected your feelings and thougts onto this choice here.