The eyes have it

Comments are always welcome.

THis image has to be view in LARGE format to be appreciated. The catch light in the eyes makes this picture. The shadow of the mother's body on the baby is unfortunate, but the best that can be done with a single light source.

 

A nice picture.

I agree with Brooks about the shadow. Nonetheless, I think this is an excellent portrait.

I agree with the above, but you live and learn. Nice one.

Well done. Beautiful eyes on both mother and child. Soft and sweet.

a great shot!

Amber i agree with the above comments, this is lovely. have you tried a crop just above the shadow, to focus on the heads and hand on the side of the baby's face? that would be very interesting to see.

Re:Ben- I decided to try the cropping you suggested, see example photo. I feel the cropping loses the intimacy from the original. I really like how his hand rests on my shoulder.

 

This is a self portrait with my son, btw. I do hate how the shadows show up on him. But it is hard to do this sort of portrait with a self timer and no idea of lighting concepts. Although this is a 3 light setup, I am still learning. Is there any suggestions on how to light this type of portrait without the shadows?

Amber, for my taste, the close-up is WAY better, and the original was pretty good so that says a lot. the emotion is in the eyes. yes, the hand is great -- but sometimes you have to give something up. of course you can keep the hand, but then you have the shadow. also, the close-up -- use unsharp mask/fade in combination and you can sharpen this some to make it really really terrific.

Amber, just tried and i think if you can the shadow out on the baby's chest, if you have photoshop, using the dodge tool set for shadows, then if you have ps 7.0 using healing brush.

Thanks Ben I will see what I can do with it. I have PS 7, so we will see! Thanks for all the helpful comments!

pleasure amber. i got started in photography taking photos of my kids. the boy reading in my candid portraits is my son about three years ago. i moved to the dog when the kids started asking for money!

This is so beautiful! Pefect title. Love it