Valeria_6

This is a beautiful photograph. Colors, sharpness, model, pose, all is wonderful - 6. I think the arms in one line and no hands could be a problem for some raters.  And I am the first writing a comment! Best regards. hen Ry

Raymond,

The lovely skin tones with gentle lighting on the shoulder looks very nice.  I would, however, make two suggestions for improvement.  

The first one goes back to portrait painting and is called a "split profile."  When the nose eclipses the far cheek and eye, allowing only part of them to show, the portrait painters suggested that their apprentices try again, either turning the model so that the far cheek and eye were not showing at all or rotate them the other way so that the nose did not reach the background and fully revealed them.  I have made this mistake and find that I tolerate it in my work if it is not as extreme as your example.  If this were my picture I would try retouching the far eye and cheek out altogether.

The second suggestion has to do with the problem of shooting on digital equipment when the subjects hair is dark and the background is black.  The hair just begins to vanish  Whatever software you are using probably contains a way to redraw or reshape the tonal response curve (may be named many things)  By changing the curve you can lighten just the dark tones without much effect upon other parts of the picture.

Regards,

Jerry

I agree with everything Jerry Matchett said except that on my monitor there is enough separation of her hair from the background---granted, a bit more light on the background would provide more dramatic separation.  The pose of the arm weakens the face profile and looks awkward.  If her chin and body were brought around to produce a 2/3 view of the face and her left forearm and upper arm were both visible, relaxed wrist with fingers curved toward the shoulder, an improved effect might be achieved.  Nice color and hair detail.