'Kristine' [B&W ed.]

This is semi-pro (at one time) model Kristine whose photo here in

Black and White is shown elsewhere in this folder in color. This is a

desaturation by color channels, primarily by red and yellow

adjustments. Your comments, critiques and observations are invited

and most welcome. If you critique or rate harshly, or wish to make a

remark, please submit a helpful and constructive comment; please

share your photographic knowledge to help improve my

photography. Thanks! Enjoy! john

The original image, which showed fine somewhat muted and in color was too 'muddy' in black and white on upload, so I quickly reworked it and added a little contrast and a little brightness, evened out 'levels' somewhat (not much) and achieved a 'look' more consonant with a true B&W portrait -- not just a desaturated color photo.

The new image may take a while to work its way through Photo.net's numerous servers, and in the meantime if you have viewed this image, your cache may keep serving you this image until you clean thumbnails from your browser cache, as browsers save old images even when they're 'new' if they have the same descriptors which the reupload may have.

john

John (Crosley)

For all the reasons I liked the color version, I like this as well. There is a drama in this one missing from the color image. Shifting this to a darker photograph with more contrast also adds a bit of mystery that I like.

I tried a straight desaturation, working on the reds and yellows, but trying for the same effect as the original and posted it.

It was unsatisfactory, so I quickly worked up one with stronger contrast, and I see that you seem to like that treatment; I'm glad I reposted this version.

Thanks for valuable feedback.

Best to you.

john

John (Crosley)

John.  I think this is a very effective nude portrait.   First (and most importantly), I like the composition.  Her eyes are captivating and I really like the highlights in the eyes, especially the one seen through her hair (masterful).  I also think having her hair cover part of her face was a good call because you end up with two strong negative spaces in opposite corners.  Compositionally, the DOF is really good.  The right side of her body (photo left) carries her form well but doesn't detract from the face.  I also like that the necklace is out of focus.  The effect for me is leading the eye from lower right to upper left (her face).  Second, I like the tonal range and think that you have done a very good job on the BW conversion.  All the best.  Dana...

What a wonderful, soup to nuts comment, and so flattering.  I sometimes wonder if I deserve such praise, especially when I took this I was incapable of speaking or writing those points -- it was mostly inchoate and natural shooting (and workup too), though the desaturation took place just before posting here.

Now, seven or so years later after taking this photo, I am more articulate about what I do and how I do it.  Then it was just 'fly by the seat of one's pants' (which were on throughout and after, I might add).

Christine was quite a good model, knew how to pose, how to hold a good pose, and though her repertoire was limited, it was good, and we had good rapport, which is a very good part of working with a semi-pro and young model in such circumstances.

I noted the rates for this have gone from 5.40 to 5.08 as the nude haters seem to have snuck in through the back door and views have climbed -- and she's only topless!

I appreciate such a thorough critique by someone with great experience, as you, plus one who is a female form shooter who 'takes chances' -- something I do (not to the extent you do of course), but often out of ignorance since I do not study the genre much if at all, and only just take my model, my camera and figure out ways to make an exposition that I think is interesting and somehow fits the rapport we have (or sometimes don't).  Often from first shot to last, it shows that rapport developing, with the first shots being very tentative the last shots showing almost complete model trust in what I do and often near mastery and a collusion between us (at least with amateurs and inexperienced models).

So, every nude shoot I do is  about as different as you can get, as you can see if you look back to when I was doing them more routinely.

I met girls tonight and several nights ago who would make terrific models, gathered phone numbers and whether nude of otherwise, I think I'll start up again!  I think at least one member will be happy about that decision (besides me).

I would get high praise for one model, then criticized to the heavens for another, yet I treated all my models well and recruited ALL of them from the same pool (nudes at least while other women came from a top model agency where I used their 'down time' top models who went abroad to be cover girls, etc. and were students in their off time and would work for me for 6 hours for $50.00, and work HARD -- but never nude -- or topless -- agency rules which were respected and strictly enforced (or so I presume since I never tried anything other than what they said was allowed).

I'm welcome back at that top agency for sure even though they gave up their commission so their girls could work with me, just to give them good experience in front of the lens, and know they weren't going to be 'felt up' by a libidinous photographer full of hormones.  (I have hormones, but models are strictly OUT of bounds and respected as fellows who are there to help make good and occasionally a great photo.)  (There may be arguments on the last point!)

Best to you Dana.

And thanks.

john

John (Crosley)