Portraits- First Post

[g-fi]

Most of these were taken with a Nikon D40 and kit lens, natural lighting. I've moved on to a Nikon D50 and kit, 50mm 1.4/24mm 2.8 F series.

1.

2.

(shot with D50 and 50mm 1.4)

3.

I'm working on moving beyond a "snapshot"-y tendency and focusing on portraiture. Any C&C is welcome. I didn't realize I had picked all B&W conversions until just now, I must be going through my B&W phase!

 

[Big Mike]

Welcome to the forum.

You have some nice shots here, certainly what I'd consider to be beyond 'snapshots'.

One thing to watch is your Depth of Field (DOF). Shooting with wide apertures can give you nice cream backgrounds which make the subject stand out, but if you go too shallow, something are left out of focus when they probably should be sharp. Or maybe you might have the slim area of focus in a less than perfect place. For example, in #2 the sharpest spot appears to be his shirt...do you think it would be better somewhere else?
In #3 the girl in the middle looks sharper & more in focus than the girls on the sides....it might be a DOF issue or maybe your particular lens is a lot sharper in the middle.

 

[g-fi]

Definitely a DOF issue. I have a tendency to stray too far to the large end of the aperature to capture that nice bokeh and only notice later in post that I missed the focus. With #2 I had just started using the 50mm lens and going from the kit lens to a prime, I didn't realize just how small that area of focus is and got the shirt instead of his face. I could blame it on manual focus + toddler, but it was really me instead . Catching the right DOF and getting my focus in exactly the right spot is a reoccuring issue.

 

[Big Mike]

It's especially hard with kids...so you are forgiven