Stephanie

Excellent work! Lovely model, nice colours, perfect DOF, contrast and details. If I had to nitpick, I would say I'm a little disturbed by the scarf between body and head... because the latter seems like chopped off. But this is pure nitpicking. Congrats and best regards, Alain

haha, I see what you mean about the scarf. I thought it might look a little bulky around her neck, but she wanted to wear it so I just went with it. :) Thanks for the feedback.

The eyes of this image are the really important feature.  Perhaps all those intertwining layers of clothing need to be eliminated.  Maybe a crop?

Jerry

Jerry loves cropping! I don't always agree, but on this pictures the yellow leaves are important part of the mood creating elements!

PDE

P.S. Maybe he's right! There is one of them yellow leaves on his crop and the eyes are really emphasized!

I'm usually not a big fan of close cropping, but it does eliminate the distracting clothes element. Thanks for the suggestion!

But it also eliminates a large part of the autumn mood... I personally prefer the original "chopped" version =)

I have to agree, Alain; I'll take "chopped" over loss of autumn mood.

And just so you know, I'll never look at this picture again without chuckling over the "chopped" thing. ;)

Sarah,

There is no question that Stephanie is a beautiful girl. Her skin tone is very nice (maybe a tad on the pink side in areas). You have focused well on her eyes and she has good eye contact with the camera (viewer). The background is nicely out of focus and she is well separated from it.

I think the burgundy color goes very well with the autumn colors of the leaves, but there appears to be three or four shades of burgundy. One shade of burgundy would work much better.

I can understand wanting to do a tight crop on her face. It would get rid of her hands and her shoulder. These areas of skin showing are a bit distracting. Because her right hand is right at the left edge of the photograph it draws the viewer's eyes right out of the photograph. It would be better if there was a dark color at the left edge to frame the photograph and help to keep the viewer's eyes within the photograph. Her shoulder, that is surrounded by darker colors, really sticks out.

I would like to keep all of her pretty hair in the photograph, too. If you are going to crop that high on her body on the left side you will need to crop into her hair on the right side to have good left and right compositionally balance. The other option would be to include more of her on the left side.

This image is top heavy. She really needs more room on top or a tighter crop on the bottom for good top and bottom compositional balance. It would be hard to crop much higher on the bottom without crowding her. It would be best to include more on the top.

Catchlights would give more life to her eyes. A little eyeliner under her eyes would frame them and help to make them stand out more.

She does have a lovely expression. Too bad so much of her face is covered. If she were to turn her head a little more towards the camera she could show the whites of her eyes on both sides of her irises. This would make her eyes look more balanced.

I have included a cropped image that I think shows better compositional balance and I have slightly lightened the shadows. I have also slightly lowered the color saturation. It would be a good idea to darken her right hand and her shoulder. I should have done that. The cropped image also eliminates some of the slightly distracting leaves in the lower right corner and your logo.

Your name and the little camera outline (logo?) are not part of the photograph. It is quite appropriate to place your name on a mat surrounding the photograph. Anything else, like a logo or any type of advertising would be better placed on the back of the photograph.

Nice shot, 

Mark

Thanks so much for such a detailed critique. I appreciate your helpfulness!

i like the way it is. not change a bit. has atmosphere, joy and wormth (look at her hands and arms... like a hug). technically: just a little sharp were it needs and maybe more texture (but thats for another sesion to keep in mind). so, in this way i see this image. keep going, Sarah!