artpinney

Janegbert:  Appreciate your honesty - I think the shot is good.  My clients think the shot is great - that's all that matters. 

Overall though, my belief is that portraits don't have to straight-forward.  I like shooting without "rules" and I believe that is one of the reasons I'm successful at what I do.  Clients see that my images are not "cookie-cutter" shots and are "out-of-the-box" - it gives them something different from what they're use to.  I stress to my interns/students to ignore the rules of photography - see with you eyes and photograph what you think looks good.  My style is not ordinary or formal.  Making the client happy is the overall goal.

Mark:  Regarding the tilt - I agree with your comment about photographers using it as a gimmick.  You can tell when it's done incorrectly.  When I was shooting this shot - tilting was not even on my mind - my focal point was the female's left arm and she was leaning into her fiance' - so a slight tilt of the cam adjusted this perspective.  And I'm not one to crop images so what you see in the majority of my shots is full-frame. 

Again - thanks for the comments!

This image was photographed three days before the start of the 2010

Winter Olympics Games. Image consists of three photographs stitch

together. Each photograph was exposed 30 seconds @ f/11. Three

filters were used: B+W cir. polarizer, Singh-Ray ND 2 stop & 3 stop 4x6.