Untitled

Thank you for viewing and for your critique.

So beautiful expresion and tonality!!

Incredible model. Nice shot.

Andrewk,

 

I love this portrait.

 

There is no question that she is a beautiful girl. You have focused on her eyes well and she has a nice alluring expression. She has great eye contact with the camera (viewer). The pastel pink tint to her lips is a fun touch -- I like it -- it is very subtle, not overdone. Your lighting is very good. The background is nicely neutral. Great specular highlights on her lips. Her make-up looks very good. The warm tone works very well with her skin.

 

I would like to see the main light just a little higher and a bit further behind her. That would make the shadow from her nose a little longer and skim the left (her left) corner of her mouth. You do have nice shadows on the left (her left) side of her face. This does add interest to your photograph, plus helps create the illusion of depth within your portrait. Very nicely done.

 

I think I would like to see her skin tone just a little bit lighter, although you are very close. The whites of her eyes look slightly grey. If you could get those white, it think her skin tone would be right on. You may then have to tone down her shoulder just a little. It is slightly brighter than her face. I think this would work, but I worry a little about the highlights on her face -- they look awfully good and I am afraid they my get too bright. You will have to see how everything comes together. Her face sure can't go much lighter.

 

I really like black as a background, especially with a girl dressed in black, but she needs a good backlight and a kicker on her right (in the back) to better separated her from the background. I would like to see you pick up some more detail in her dress. I love that lace on her.

 

The top and bottom compositional balance is very good. I would move her a tad to her right or crop a bit off the left side. 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.

 

One catch light per eye is preferred. It would be best at about the 10 or 2 o'clock position on her irises.

 

Nice shot,

 

Mark

excellent...congrats

I like this portrait very much. Mark makes many good technical points. I like the feeling I get from the image. You have made many effective choices that gives this personality. I like the unusual composition as it adds a bit of tension that draws me in.

Gorgeous image with amazing model. Warm regads.

There has been a lot of comment on this site as to how the attractiveness of a model affects our appreciation of purely photographic qualities. Thus I hasten to assure you that her perfect curves, amazing hair and total come-hither expression have no bearing whatever on my... Hell, can't do it with a straight face.

 

All right, I'm smitten. Anyway, you've done an excellent job with the pose here, and the lighting is generally top-notch. I'm of two minds about the merger between her dress and the background. My left brain says that you should have used a kicker/reflector as Mark suggest. My right brain loves the added emphasis the merger seems to give to her face and skin.

 

I love the little 'escaped' curls of hair, and those straps are so damn sexy.

 

EDIT: I forgot to mention that I think the eyes could do with a bit more sharpening.

 

EDIT 2: Tried some overall sharpening, and I think the image as a whole benefits from it.

Mark C. thank you very much for your comments. I am glad that you like this portrait. All your comments are very helpful. I have a very bright monitor and the tonality looked OK. But I looked at the picture on a different monitor and I agree that a bit brightening is in order. I made the corrections and replaced the image. It may take few days for the buffer to be cleared and actual replacement to take place.

 

Les thank you for your comments. There is one point that I respectfully disageree. I think that the eyes are reasonably sharp. I used CZ lens and it is very sharp. Look at the large size. I also attached cropped eye picture at full magnification.

 

Mehmet, Jorge and Mark H. thank you very much for your encouraging remarks.

 

pretty girl :)

what did you want to reach by desaturation?

The lens you used is indeed a very sharp one, but you did not sharpen the file sufficiently. Looking at your 100% crop, it looks very soft; I would not want to print larger than 5x7. I've attached a sharpened version--I did it quickly, but you will get the idea. Remember, I had only a JPEG to work with, so there will be a few artifacts. Look closely at the eyebrows and lashes, and the detail in her hair and the lace netting on her arm.

Attached.

Christopher,

 

I realize that B&W photography is very difficult and requires experience and great degree of sensibility or in other word talent. My idea was simple and not very sophisticated.

I wanted to remove color destruction to eliminate the non-important information and keep the essentials of the composition. I noticed that the picture looked a bit more intriguing with some residual color left. Enclosed is a miniature version of the color photo. I wonder if I was correct.

 

Les,

 

Thank you very much for your editing.

 

Regards,

 

Andrew

I am not going to join the discussion,I love the shot.

I like the warm tone. Something I have been experimenting with.

Great work ... lovely.

Andrew, what you consider "residual color " I think "warm tone". I shoot only BW. What I have been experimenting with is this: I convert the BW to sepia and then desaturate and leave just a trace of sepia to lend the portrait "warm". Partial desaturation of a color photo I sometimes come up with a photo with a slight blue or red or green tint.

Meir,

 

What I did is as follows:

 

View channels R only.

 

Drag R channel into create new channel and copy.

 

Return to RGB, view layers

 

Paste red channel blending mode normal opacity 84%. So residual color is 26%

 

Image is in an RGB format. If you are interested I can send you info with actual sacreen shots from PS.

 

I may be in Israel for a year starting in August. Perhaps you can teach me something about street photos.

 

majority executes the desaturation of colourful picture, because such is fashion. It one should was not interfere in picture without reason. If such conception is to whole cycle was in definite tone this it is OK because to be visible author's intention.

Piotrowski to polskie nazwisko raczej :)

old masters had founded on lens special caps to portrait was soft :)

Christopher,

 

Nazwisko nie tylko polskie ale jedno z najbardziej popularnych. Modelka tez jest Polka.

 

Thanks a lot for you visit and comments.

I have Version 2 Adobe Photoshop Elements. It has only the basic tools. Would be a pleasure to meet you if you come to Israel.

I have Photoshop "Elements", Version 2.0. Not very much I can do to a photo with very basic tools. I have never seen a difference between shooting BW Raw or Shooting Color Raw and convert to BW. If I convert a Color to BW I usually do Enhance->Adj Color->Remove Color. The result on my monitor is the same as Desaturate 100%. I am never interested in having a color photograph. Color is not what I do. As for "not interfere..." I make a warm tone BW when I am trying to simulate the Ilford Fiber Base Warm Tone Black and White dark room paper...as opposed to the Ilford "Cold Tone". It is a new thing for me which I am trying out. Ilford recommended warm tone for portraits. So that is the "reason" that I "interfere". In the beginning of making "warm tone" I shot a color and desaturated but not completetly to 100%. Photonetters told me that I had residule blue tone or red tone or green tone. I don't see colors well so I did not know. Thereafter I desaturate only sepia BW to avoid the the green, blue, red etc. hues which are there but I cannot see.

 

 

I discovered that I get sharper eyes/lashes if I focus on the eye in "offset" focus. To "central" focus on the eye and then recompose changes the distance from the eye to the sensor plane and if the lens is wide or near wide open the change in focus is noticable. Probably everyone knew this except me perhaps because I trained with film where offset focus is not possible. With tripod you will never have a sharpness problem.