Pet Portraiture

[One Sister]

This is the kind of stuff we do. Our customers like it, but I've never had a photog's critique. I hope you don't mind if I post a few of these along the way, as I'm new to TPF. Thanks in advance for any feedback.

 

[Traxtor]

hmm.. This picture seems very grainy to me? Did you use a high ISO setting on this or something? Or was that the way the customers liked it?

 

[One Sister]

f/16.0, 1/160, ISO-200

Uh oh. One of my fears is that I see something that others don't or that I don't see what others do...uhhhh, no, my customers did not want a grainy portrait, but I'm not seeing the grainy-ness. Do you mean on the background? 'Cause NO, no one wanted or wants grain in my studio, unless it's background noise, which sometimes provides a little extra texture to a photo. I might provide some effects later for my taste, but not in this instance, for sure.

Thanks for the feedback!

 

[MarcusM]

Yea, I see it too. It just looks like a lot of artifacts in the black background. Was this saved as a JPEG a few times?

Other than that, it looks like a decent shot.

 

[Mesoam]

what are you using for lighting...

 

[noescape]

Would be even better if the collar was right-side-up!

Beautiful Dane...

 

[One Sister]

This one was only saved once as a jpg. I see what you mean, though. I just printed it again and there were way less artifacts, but still discernible. On the other hand the tiff looks great to me.

Lighting: 1 AB B-1600 with 47" Octabox, 1 AB B-800 with Honeycomb grid and 1 SB 800 speed light pointed at a large reflector.

Set Up: Key from subject is left of center. Hair light (B-800) is to the right of subject and slightly behind. Speed light is camera mounted.

Thanks again for all the help.

 

[Los Angeles]

the dogs collar is on upside down.

 

[Harmony]

Cute face, but the wrinkled background ruins it for me.

 

[TCimages]

must be a difference in monitor settings. I can barely see the wrinkles or the grain on either of my monitors, but it is visible. I run into this problem when I edit images with a black background. The background will look very dark and when I see it on another monitor you can see all my edits. Looks horrible.

I think it's a great picture tho.