nudes 2012 Tinct. Chinae comp.

From my latest session this year. Hope you like it, so her look is really special... ;-)

Hi Steffen, I think this is an excellent photo. The light and the setting fit beautifully and create a great atmosphere. The woman in the photo is beautiful and the light and shadows do a great job of giving her a real depth. If there is one little thing that bothers me, it is the fact that her face does not seem to fit to the way she is sitting there. I don't know what to make of the photo because her body says "relaxed" and her face says "watch out". And that contrast does not seem to make sense in this setting. But maybe that is just me ...

Great body. She seems to be very multidimensional and it would be interesting to see even more photos of her up for critique. She makes you look and think.

something fresh

PDE

regards

Steffen,  

 This is a most interesting image, because it really demonstrates a great number of compositional problems.  

 First and foremost is the existence of several "light traps" - a term that means bright elements that draw the eyes away from the subject. Foremost among these is the window placed right in the corner. With its associated glassware it is easily the lightest and brightest part of the image and the viewer must constantly fight to keep the model in view, with the eyes so easily drawn to the corner. Hold a piece of black paper over that corner and you will easily see the difference.  The white pitcher and associated objects on the top of the cabinet to the left do a similar but less bright job of distraction.

The expression on the models face has been already mentioned by another, so I will just say I noticed it's incongruity also.

 The repetitious knobs on the cabinet almost seem like a visual joke repeating the model's nipples.  The picture could have been composed to emphasize that and it would have been quite compellingly humorous. 

 I will say that you are brave to try to make a square-shaped composition.  Images composed in the vertical and the horizontal have truly different effects upon the viewer.  Hasselblad tried for years to convince people that the square format had virtue, but few ever believed it.  I used square format cameras for years, but I always painted two parallel lines both vertically and horizontally, on the ground glass,  so that I could make either composition work later, when prints were to be made and mounted in the wedding album.

 Try holding that black paper again and block off the right side and then the left. You will see two alternate compositions, each of which work better than the square.

My regards,

Jerry Matchett

Hi Jerry,

I would like to comment on what you have said because I think you have made some very important points that need to be considered in every composition. And yet, although I understand exactly what you were irritated by, those same elements did not have the same effect on me - and I find that fact very interesting.

First the question of the light traps - one of my pet peeves in many compositions - does not bother me here at all. Maybe because the window and the ceramic jar on the other side form a straight line when taken together with the slightly too bright area on the left side of her face? Or is it simply because I find the eyes and the facial expression so irritating that I have to look there and nowhere else? I cannot give a definitive answer, but I do know that I did not (and do not) find the individual bright areas distracting.

Nor do the repetitious knobs bother me. I did not have the association that you did and I find that they simply add to the feeling of "fullness" of "crowded space" that the photo has.

Finally there is the question of a square format which, I agree, is usually quite difficult. Here it is a bit of a problem because it makes the subject's body seem to be a bit off-centre, and effect that would not have been so strong with another format.

It would have been interesting to try some other compositions of the same photo to see what sort of effect it really would have. But I still find it a very strong photo!