Ethan (Please View Large)

Please view large. Cropped & desaturated only. Shot in Raw with white

background, 2 large softboxes, 2 backlights on background.

 

Comments & critiques welcome.

Great eyes, another excellent shot! Nice composition...

Very well done. Fine detail in the hair. I would say you achieved your objective. Cheers.

Transfixing eyes Jayme, this is a wonderful high key portrait. I prefer the toning of this one to the other BTW.

be very proud Jayme! This is so good it leaves me gasping for breath! You can get lost in those eyes! Wish I could give it 10/10, hope you will settle for 7/7!

Great portrait Jayme. I always love your hi-key shots and details in the eyes (your trademark). The detail and crispness of his hair is also very good. As far as suggestions, not many. I like heads tilted a little one way but I think that is just personal preference versus a critique. I am looking forward to seeing more and more of your work:-)

Besides the fact that this little boy is VERY adorable, I love this picture. The lighting, tones, quality, everything is great. And the fact that he's off to the side and not centered makes it look great. His hair is very well detailed. Lovely. Great job! Keep up the good work. ;)

Thanks for all the nice coments. They are greatly appreciated.

 

Emily- I agree, I have a few more with different facial expressions, but this stare is so typical Ethan. He looks at you as though he is studying you, so knowing him well, I thought this one captured his personality the best. He is so much like his grandfather, it's kind of scary :o

Whatever is going on with his eyes is distracting and a bit out of place with the remainder of the composure of the image.

Looks like a couple of softboxes to me.

John- I don't agree about Ethan's eyes. You & I rarely agree on much, so I don't find it surprising we don't agree here. I see him everyday & this pretty much reflects what he looks like. I, personally feel it accents that "intelligent, playful" sparkle in his eyes (of which he certainly has & is). He's related to me:) Almost like 2 large natural light windows reflected. I recently looked over a very high end fashion magazine, to my surprise, almost every image featured double catch lights similar to these. So "what's going on" is 2 softboxes. A few even had additional zigzag reflectors (under the chin). But thanks for offering your 2 cents.

 

You are right Ben, 2 softboxes. Both were needed to achieve the controlled over-exposure on this hi-key effect. Even, controlled light. I tried using 2 round umbrellas, but I found the light was too harsh, not diffused enough. I also tried 2 lights with equal degreed diffusers, they also were way too harsh. I found that soft, strong diffusion is the key with well placed backlights to blow out the background but still leave enough detail around the hair & head.

 

This was NOT an easy 1-2-3 setup. I used precise measuring of distance of subject to light (3 feet) on the large softboxes (1600 AlienBees), a large white square 4x4 reflector (which I made out of PVC pipe & white plastic material) under the camera to the front & 2 bright (1600 AlienBees) lights aimed at the white seamless background, to burn it out & create a soft bounce of light. I light metered each light individually & then together to get exact & even output. I encourage others to try it. This is why the straight forward view into the camera, for even light. Both sides the same. A side view also works, but a half view does not, makes the side toward the softbox too light, or blown out.

 

Again, this was NOT manipulated out of the camera, other than to adjust it in RAW to bring back the edge details & desaturated. Much as one would do if they were developing it in a chemical darkroom. I followed instructions from an "old" book on this process except I developed in RAW instead of in a traditional darkroom. No PS burning or dodging, no removal of background, etc. The only thing I did was crop & frame in PS. I think it shows some of the diverse capabilities of digital & light, much like film cameras.

 

It was a nice experiment anyway!

 

As an after thought, I will try to scan in the image of my husband, taken in 1951, of the typical white on white, his mother had taken. I used his image as a standard to gauge these images of my grandkids. These will be printed on fine art matte paper, hand-colored with Marshall's oils & hung precisely over my fireplace in a neat grouping. Jake is the only one I have to complete, he was not available on Sept. 2, like the other 3 were. I will scan my husband's, & try to convert an image of myself at a similar age & hand-color these 2 to match. Just for fun!

2 cents? c'mon, at least 50 cents here. My viewpoint is that if you can resolve the issues with the reflections in the eyes, it would make a huge difference to your benefit.

But... you are not hearing me..... I like the reflections! :)

......I get this comment about more than 1 reflection from old fashioned (imho) photographers. There is only 1 sun , they say, you can only have 1 reflection , they say.

There is no sun in my studio , I say.

But if there was, they say.

The sun tan lotion would get everywhere, I say.

Are you serious, they say.

Yes, I say.

No point talking to you, they say.

Thats good news, I say.

Louis- nice reply, I'll remember that! I have several suns in my studio, at least 5. The suntan lotion is flowing freely! :)

Convert to B/w. I use a PS plugin by Power retouche called B/W studio.

 

I note you say controlled overexposure. Without wishing to annoy I would suggest that it is not necessary and indeed not good for digital best quality. Unless you are just talking about the backdrop and not the skin of the subject!

 

You can retain the Tshirt detail(if you wish) and still have that white skin tone.

Just so you know I set my backdrop reading at 4/3 of a stop higher than the meter reading from the "face to camera " position.

More notes if you want.

 

Cheers

Louis

Sounds interesting Louis. Tell me more! This controlled over-exposure was the easiest I have found, but if you have something easier, e-mail me, I am interested! Naw.. to the backdrop, that's easy, it's the skin that's difficult to make white & leave the important details.

What would your meter reading be A. at the backdrop B. at the subjects face. C. what way do you convert to B/W.

Louis

This is exquisite, Jayme..... I love it!!!

I like much of your work but this is my favorite. It's simple, direct and the kid is beautiful. On conversions to B&W try Duplicate Layer, Channel Mixer- Image>Adjustment>Channel Mixer>R:55,G:45,B:10, check Monochrome. You might like the tones.

Thanks Michael, I'll try this :)