Milane - Tinkerbell

During my early studying of photography.... kindly request your critique.

Many thanks.

Rene,

Milane is a beautiful girl. She has applied her make-up very well. The background is nicely neutral and out of focus which allows the viewer's eyes to be drawn to the subject. She is well separated from the background. Because she is nicely thin, you can use broad lighting, which works very well.

Milane is not making eye contact with the camera (viewer). She appears to be looking above and to the right of the camera. If not making eye contact with the camera, the eyes should follow the line of the nose. It is natural to look where your head is pointing. If looking off to the side or somewhere else, you should show what she is looking at or provide a reason that she is not looking where her head is pointing. Because of her lack of eye contact, I don't feel her expression is conveying any message to the viewer.

Her eyes are not in critical focus. Her ear is more in focus than her eyes. You must make sure to focus on the eye nearest the camera. You do have a hint of a catch light in her left eye. She needs catch lights in both eyes to make her eyes come alive.

Her skin tone is nice, but the highlights are a little bright. Milane’s shoulder is lighter than her face, which draws attention away from her face. It is usually best to have her face lighter than any other part of the photograph. It is the most important part of a portrait. You want the viewer's eyes drawn to your subject's face.

The towel or clothing over her breast is too bright. You have lost detail in it. It is also too tight. It is causing her chest to bulge. This is a very awkward crop. It makes her breast look like it is an odd shape.

The crop on top is too tight. She needs headroom. Never have the top of your frame touch the hair. Either crop into it like you mean it or give her head room. Cropping into the hair implies you are going to do a tight crop on the bottom.

Your subject should have more room in front of her than behind. This allows her to be facing into the picture, not out of it. You have too much room in front of her. There is a lot of wasted space in your frame. It is quite common to shoot vertical subject in a vertical format. You want to compositionally balance the left and right sides of the photograph. The compositional "rule" for this suggests that you position the tip of the subject's nose in the vertical center of the photograph.

Be careful of split profiles. You do not want the tip of her nose to come close to touching the far cheek line. You want to make sure the far eye is either completely showing or not showing at all. You do not want to have the bridge of her nose cut her far eye.

With her head down and turned back that much towards the camera, she will have wrinkles in her neck. It might help if she held her head straighter. It does look a little awkward to be tilted down that much. Another option would be to not have her turned away from the camera or to not have her turn her head back to look at the camera.

Nice shot,

Mark