2 photos for C&C from beach

spudgunr · May 14, 2009

My wife and I had a chance for a night from our son so we did a photoshoot of her for a couple hours at the beach. Here are the two that I thought were best. I already know that on the jumping one she is a bit blurred, unfortunately my D60's x-sync speed is only 1/200th of a second, the sun was low and there were lots of shadows otherwise so I used fill flash. Color corrected on eyes in one, and overall on the other to more reflect reality (and a tiny amount of blemish removal). If it hadn't been so windy she had a skirt we were going to get pictures with, but I have ideas for next trip.

Thanks.

Edit: And I just saw I'm inconsistant with my watermarks ;-)

Sirashley · May 14, 2009

The first shot is fantastic... I love it

The second shot is very strong. The pose is good and lighting is good as well. Did you use a reflector? If not, I think the shot could have benefitted from one to remove the shadow on her face. Also, I would smooth out the cheeks and nose with the heal tool in photoshop. Seriously though, great work! These shots are excellent...

spudgunr · May 14, 2009

Thank you for the comments. I was not using a reflector, I just started photography 4 or 6 weeks ago. I used a flash, but it was very bright out with the sun at an angle. Plus, my wife just threw that pose at me

We only had a couple hours at the beach, but due to the wind that was really all we could utilize anyway. (we had to get back for biggest losers finale).

Is there a way I can increase the power of my flash to get rid of that shadow without washing anything out? I just let the flash figure out whatever it wanted to do, it was on the balanced fill flash mode (sb-800).

xUnknownSoul · May 14, 2009

Wow, the colors on the first photo are great!

I think the second photo would look fantastic as a B&W with some contrast. Do you mind if I take it and show you what i mean?

SarahTomlin · May 14, 2009

Very impressive. And she is quite stunning.

spudgunr · May 14, 2009

Yes, please do. I am a bit lacking in creativity and am too lazy to make all pictures black and white to see what it looks like (and can't picture stuff in my head well, including poses. I have to see them through the viewfinder).

sjluto · May 14, 2009

Both are beautiful! I love the colors and her hair is a gorgeous contrast with the green and blue. Not that I'm saying you did, but for some reason the first feels like she's been pasted against a blue sky. I don't know, it reminds me of a green (blue?) screen shot from a movie. I love the pose and colors though!

The second one is beautiful as well, but I agree about the shadows on her face. That's the first thing I noticed about the picture. I looked at it and thought, hmmm... I wish that shadow wasn't on her face.

Great job though!

spudgunr · May 14, 2009

Yes, when I saw the result on the jumping picture I too thought it looked fake, but it is real. All I did on it was adjust saturation and hue (I don't know the difference, I adjusted the sliders in the color changing thing until it looked good (and the dress came out to its actual color). The raw picture didn't have nearly enough saturation. I may have over done it past reality a bit, but not by much though.

I had my wife stand on a ledge (1ft tall) and I layed on the ground, just the bottom of the frame at about her ankles and had her jump. We did two tries, this is actually not the one she prefers, she liked the other one better (I chopped off her hand though, she could jump higher than I thought).

xUnknownSoul · May 14, 2009

Saturation is the intensity of the color, and Hue is the actual color itself.

Here is what I came up with. Normally my photos are very dark and contrasty so the first time I did it, she actually looked brunette in the B&W. So I redid it.

johnj2803 · May 14, 2009

great photos! the black and white photo i think is too dark...

keep shooting

Sirashley · May 14, 2009

Here is an edit with the skin editing I thought would make it pop... I adjusted the eyes as well...

I did the skin edit to even it out, but also to even out the shadow alittle bit and make it work...Truthfully, I suck at photoshop, so someone who really knows what they are doing could make this photo pop... Lastly, I tried to tone down the shadow on her face , which I actually think works when toned down...Anyway, freakin great shot man...

Oh yeah, lastly, I removed two letters from your watermark to prove a point. If you are going to post photos of this quality, you may want to develop a better watermark cause sooner or later, someone will steal these... Just a tip :sexywink:

LuckySo-n-So · May 14, 2009

Wow. Red hair. Blue eyes. My weakness.

Great photo (#2). It is pretty darn good as it is, but you are right, I think a little pp could make it "off the charts fantastic," to steal a phrase from someone else.