Girl with pink shawl

Exellent!!!!! I like it a lot!

great portrait, for me seems the skin has taken also a little bit pink

Great work ... !! Beautiful ... regards

You continue to impress with your great eye for detail and the nice balance of colour and effective use of lighting.. You give the eyes a nice deep appearance that adds to the image... Well done my friend... MJ

Best regards Zachar!

PDE

Amazing. I love it.

Very beautiful and a genuinely outstanding portrait. Congratulations

Great light and skin tones. Nice overall colors.  Very interesting portrait, there is something compelling in her eyes. Something sad maybe.  Nicely done. Regards - michel

Elegante personalità !

Marvelous image. Incredible control of all elements. Congratulations.

Hugh

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This is a very beautiful model and I just love the lighting and muted colors of this picture. What I don't like is the pose. She looks like she is giving herself a neck adjustment. The two hands and neck turn are awkward looking. The shawl is a nice prop but information at the bottom of the frame is excessive and doesn't help the portrait. I'd crop up a bit to improve the composition.

I find the distortion of the wider angle lens distasteful ... and becuase one shoots with a 3:2 camera doesn't mean you have to present it in that format.

I like the lighting & color. Love the eyes. I agree with Louis about the possible tighter crop for a stronger compostion

Most of Zackar's images seem to be staged for effect and this one is no exception (I really found the two children's portraits different and fresh) but this one is sort of over the top as mentioned above. The hands aren't really working for me either.

The only other things I would mention that hasn't been already is that in the lightest area of the skin around the right (our right) eye is getting some color blow back from the covering and creating an odd purplish change in color there. It was the first thing that jumped out at me when I looked at the image. It could be neutralized rather easily and I think it would be worth doing.

This is a technically well done portrait. The slight imperfections, if they really such, can easily be correction. What this portrait lacks is sufficient life. The pose is artificial. The expression on the face is that of someone who has been told to watch the birdie.
Overall, I am impressed with the artist's technical skills. I feel, however, the subject is a mere subordinate of those skill in this image and nothing else.

I'm a little concerned about hell freezing over, but I must say I very much agree with Alex on this one. Well said. :-)

Thanks Fred G. I think hell is doing all right :-)

Sorry about the gross typos. Wuz ina hurrrry.

Well, I had to post a little comment this week after finding this picture on the front page of photo.net and after reading the first and interesting comments on this page. Just judging from the monitor I'm using here, this picture's weakness would be the color saturation, which seems a bit strong, and the color balance - a bit warm, and mostly a bit too red as I see it. In fact, this picture would work fine in black and white, or with colors which would be as gentle - as low in saturation - as possible... In my opinion, and based on this particular monitor only.
Besides that, what I have to say is that the expression works very well for me, and in a fairly unusual way... Indeed, the shawl and the hands look very artificial... But I happen to like it... Does Mona Lisa look very alive to you, or rather posing for the painter...? Very posed, Mona Lisa is nevertheless a masterpiece... Why ? And the fact that it worked at that time and as a painting should it mean that a very posed portrait should work nowadays as a photograph...? Not sure about that, BUT... I think the very posed attitude will always work better if the eyes have it, i.e. if the eyes are taking us further than the contrieved world of posed portraits. Here, as I see it, the eyes are almost asking the photographer - and now asking the viewer - " IS IT OK LIKE THIS ?" or perhaps... " WHAT DO YOU WANT TO TAKE A PICTURE OF ME FOR...? " In both cases, I get the impression that the person in this image is questionning us about the picture itself, or about the act of taking pictures in general... Just my own personal view, of course... Wonder whether anyone else sees something like that in this expression...? Anyway, that's why I like this picture a lot... Congrats to the photographer.

Marc, just to be clear, I have absolutely nothing against poses and nothing against even obvious poses at that. I love theater so I know how important exaggerated pose and gesture can be. And I don't elevate "natural" over artificial and I don't elevate candid over staged. But there are still poses that work for me and others that don't. This one doesn't work, not because it's artificial-looking or posed-looking but because it's awkwardly between posed and natural, comes off at least to me as a posed look trying to look natural and missing. It's simply not giving me anything. The one thing Mona Lisa has is a calm contentedness, a pose with no awkwardness at all. Yes, a clear portrait pose but with about as much grace and ease as one could ever imagine. The pose in this photo has a bit of grace but not much ease. And the technique does overshadow the humanity. The photo is saying, to me, I want to be a good portrait. It is not giving me the subject. Mona Lisa, herself, consumes me . . . and is a great portrait brilliantly executed.

I love the subtle colour and the look of being a painting, I would be very pleased with that one!

I like this photo very much - the pose, the color and the textures. What throws me off is the catchlights - they're not symmetrical. And in order for this model to really make contact with the lens, the viewer, I believe that they should be.

Cheers ~

Alberta

Strong composition and strong aesthetic, though a good bit of it due to post-processing. Too unnaturally smooth for my taste. She looks lethargic and uninspired, so it doesn't do much for me as a portrait.

Her open mouth and the redness around her eyes made me wonder 'does she have a horrible cold?'. That would explain the shawl as well. The only thing missing to complete that scenario is a red nose.
I agree that the photography is commendable. The pose is weak as is the colour pallet.