C&C for my first three photoshoots - Migena

[smoke665]

Sony DSC-HX100V.
It's a point and shoot camera; the lens is the lens and the flash is the flash. Not interchangeable.

Okay a lot of the earlier comments on don't necessarily apply to this camera. Despite the limitations you seem to have a decent eye for an image, but as in all things, you need to learn and understand your tools. If you don't have the manual here's a link to a manual on your camera. Sony eSupport - DSC-HX100V - Support I did notice that there are several "defaults" that come in to play. You need to familiarize yourself to how this camera works.

Lighting is not rocket science. There are countless youtube videos out there on lighting from ambient and flash to studio, as well as ways to utilize your on board camera flash. Here's a multi-part series that's pretty good on flash Strobist: Lighting 101: Balancing Flash and Ambient, Pt 1 Likewise a quick search will yield all sorts of reference on posing.

While it's always important that you practice, my personal observation is that you're jumping into the water without learning to swim first. While we all drool over having a live model to shoot, paying for one at this stage is somewhat of a waste. You would be better off as someone suggested getting a mannequin head to practice on, something you can turn/adjust/move to study how the light falls, how it effects exposure, DOF....... Once you have the basics then move to a live model, but limit yourself to one good pose, before you start jumping all over the scale.

 

[chuasam]

I don’t like her expression
The crops are awkward
I would like to see the framing either tighter or looser.

 

[ElNico]

I believe you're sort of referring to "depth of field" (DoF). DoF is the term which describes the amount of an image (from "front" to "back") which is in sharp focus.

I know what depth of field means. What I was referring to, is what the link you posted calls focal distance, and is what I thought you meant when you said focal length. Apologies for getting the two mixed up.

Despite the limitations you seem to have a decent eye for an image

Thanks, I appreciate that.

Lighting is not rocket science. There are countless youtube videos out there on lighting from ambient and flash to studio, as well as ways to utilize your on board camera flash. Here's a multi-part series that's pretty good on flash Strobist: Lighting 101: Balancing Flash and Ambient, Pt 1

Thanks, I shall look into that!

Likewise a quick search will yield all sorts of reference on posing.

I think I've learned enough about posing at this point that my problem isn't lack of knowledge in that area (with one notable exception regarding weight distribution which I may make a thread about in the near future), though I probably need more practice implementing it. My tome is the excellent Picture Perfect Posing by Roberto Valenzuela.

While it's always important that you practice, my personal observation is that you're jumping into the water without learning to swim first. While we all drool over having a live model to shoot, paying for one at this stage is somewhat of a waste.

Six months ago I probably wouldn't have expected two out of my first three shoots to be paid shoots. The problem is that I had very little success in lining up TFP shoots, so I was hoping that biting the bullet and paying for a shoot would give me a leg up in improving my portfolio.

Even then, I didn't go out looking for models to hire to this end. In the case of Skye, she's someone I was especially interested in working with and was probably going to pay for eventually, but I had been expecting to get more TFP shoots for practice inbetween when we first started talking and when the weather got warmer (which was several months). In the case of Sadie, she reached out to me, and I liked her profile enough to ask for her rates.

limit yourself to one good pose, before you start jumping all over the scale.

Again, while I agree with your basic point, I think this is an exaggeration. I like what tirediron said in the second thread about spending about half the shoot doing this.

 

[ElNico]

I don’t like her expression

Been discussed.

The crops are awkward
I would like to see the framing either tighter or looser.

Can you elaborate on this? You want the photos to be cropped either more or less? Anything but the extent to which I cropped it??
I will confess that the images from this shoot were edited long before I learned that you should really try to maintain the aspect ratio when cropping a photo. I admit I didn't want to go back and fix all of them before posting them here.

 

[chuasam]

I don’t like her expression

Been discussed.

The crops are awkward
I would like to see the framing either tighter or looser.

Can you elaborate on this? You want the photos to be cropped either more or less? Anything but the extent to which I cropped it??
I will confess that the images from this shoot were edited long before I learned that you should really try to maintain the aspect ratio when cropping a photo. I admit I didn't want to go back and fix all of them before posting them here.

Understand the rule of 3rds.
It’s cropped too tight to provide context yet cropped too loosely to really give an intimate feel. Let me get to my desktop and find some examples I took.
I don’t have a P&S (apart from my underwater camera ) but I’ll post images using purely ambient light.

 

[chuasam]

Closer (ambient light)

Looser ambient light outdoors

even looser

build a connection with your models before you even lift the camera
looser yet...and build a moment

just so you don't think it's all young and pretty

 

[smoke665]

just so you don't think it's all young and pretty

I was onboard with everything until this statement above the last shot. Shame on you I'd take one of her to a 1000 of the others. There is no age limit on being pretty, just the parameters we use to judge change. By the way the whole series is very good. I like how you've made use of the ambient light.

 

[Derrel]

This is the best of the three shoots. The model has a great figure, a pretty face, and is my definition of the hot latina model of the 21st century. No visible tattoos is a rarity these days, so maybe she's more like a 1980's gal? Jajaja. Anyway, for a non-interchangeable lens camera, these are pretty good. Yes, there are some minor quibbles, like the armpit flesh in the one shot, yes, but that's reality, and that comes down to styling and posing; some garments will create issues with where skin flows over the top of a bra, top,blouse,or tube dress, or where a little bit of skin creates an unattractive 'issue'. My experience is that the personality of the woman, the tension of the shoot, and the speed of the shoot can cause one to overlook or to "literally not notice" small details,at the shooting time, but then to find that when the images are developed, the flaws in the styling of the clothes, or the poses used, show the unattractive issues. This is one of those things where, during the shoot, the photographer has to look at the model almost like a computer, like The Terminator's machine-brain sees a target; retinal scan, check, blouse buttons, check, hair flyaways,check, armpit fold at top of dress: dzzzzzzzt! error,error! Resolve issue! That's the way I was taught--scan for errors: hairs, cat hair, pils on sweaters, lint, necklace or chain clasps,out of sight, hanging pendants on chains, hanging down properly, neckties knotted perfectly and high-upo covering the shirt top button.

This shoot of Migena has a sultry vibe, despite what a poster says above, I see no real irritation, but I do understand the comment. The way I see it. Migena is a gorgeous lady, but her modeling skills are not fully refined; her microexpressions are subtly not quite right, yet she's getting it. If you continue working with her, she'll get better, and you'll get better. of the three models, she is the best, the most exotic, and the one that has the best potential. I'm offering C&C on a different level. Some amateur models (who are, for the most part, prettier-than-average gals who like being photographed) will, after a few shoots, turn in performances that just keep getting better and better. I think Migena is a model I personally would want to photograph on a regular basis; I think she'll develop into a very good model, and shoots with her will be productive.

As far as the camera you have...it has plusses. Personally, I'd consider tripod-mounting it for at least parts of a shoot. The tripod slows you down, forces you to set up and evaluate the pose, and the camera placement, to a much higher degree than shooting hand-held. It's hard to explain without 500 words, but trust me...try a tripod for some shots on a shoot of this type, and you'll soon see what it improves about the final photos. A tripod allows you to refine various things about a specific shot, and once dialed in, then you're able to shoot, and pose, and keep the frame and backgrond perfect, and,well, try it sometime.

Regarding lighting: fill-in light from reflectors, bedsheets,white pizza boxes, Office Depot poster boards, and big sheets of 4x8 foot insulation board (white or silvered, from Home Depot, Lowe's,etc.). Or fill-in from an electronic flash unit that is off the camera and triggered by either an optical slave, or a radio or infrared-fired remote...something to think about.

The BIG, insulation-board sized reflectors are the easiest to buy and use. For $12.00 you can have an awesome reflector that, when used in a hotel room or other room like this, will bounce-back a LOT of light onto the clothes and model. Keep shooting this model, she has tremendous potential, and your shots of her while not technically great, show promise.

 

[Derrel]

I see some real potential in Migena. It's up to her, and to you, to improve the posing and wardrobe styling. Here's what I mean, some quick crops and conversions out of your originals. She has tremendous camera appeal, and will with more modeling practice, become very proficient at modeling. These photos show there's a diamond in the rough here. These expressions are complex, a bit tricky to identify, enigmatic. If this is how she looks on a day she's feeling poorly, it's a credit to her ability as a model.

 

[ElNico]

Understand the rule of 3rds.
It’s cropped too tight to provide context yet cropped too loosely to really give an intimate feel. Let me get to my desktop and find some examples I took.
I don’t have a P&S (apart from my underwater camera ) but I’ll post images using purely ambient light.

In terms of framing, the third and fifth photos you posted look very similar to what I did when cropping most of my photos (if perhaps less so in this shoot, as again I wasn't maintaining the aspect ratio, but definitely in the other two); her face and torso are in the upper third vertically, and in the center horizontally. Can you explain the difference between those two and mine, in terms of framing?

I'll read through Derrel's post later.

 

[ElNico]

my definition of the hot latina model of the 21st century

She's not latina, she's eastern European. I thought she was latina too when I first met her.

This is one of those things where, during the shoot, the photographer has to look at the model almost like a computer, like The Terminator's machine-brain sees a target; retinal scan, check, blouse buttons, check, hair flyaways,check, armpit fold at top of dress: dzzzzzzzt! error,error! Resolve issue! That's the way I was taught--scan for errors: hairs, cat hair, pils on sweaters, lint, necklace or chain clasps,out of sight, hanging pendants on chains, hanging down properly, neckties knotted perfectly and high-upo covering the shirt top button.

Thanks. I've been trying to do that already, but obviously it takes practice.

This shoot of Migena has a sultry vibe, despite what a poster says above, I see no real irritation, but I do understand the comment.

Here's her other work. Some of the expressions are kind of lively (especially this one; the reasons for the difference may be subtle but I think her expression there is very compelling), but for the most part she seems to gravitate towards the same kind of neutral expression she has here. She doesn't look as tired as she does here (and feeling lousy can surly mess you up in lots of subtle ways that are hard to put a finger on), but I would say that she looks about equally detached, emotionless, and bored. Again, that doesn't have to be a criticism; lots of portrait photography is like that, and it's even more valid when the point of the image is to emphasize the makeup, as I believe is the case in most of her photos. But if a model looking "bored" is a problem for you, then I'm not sure if it's just this shoot. Though, again, she herself thought the poses were good but that her expression was affected.

As far as the camera you have...it has plusses. Personally, I'd consider tripod-mounting it for at least parts of a shoot. [...] It's hard to explain without 500 words, but trust me...try a tripod for some shots on a shoot of this type, and you'll soon see what it improves about the final photos.

Thanks for the tip.

Regarding lighting: fill-in light from reflectors, bedsheets,white pizza boxes, Office Depot poster boards, and big sheets of 4x8 foot insulation board (white or silvered, from Home Depot, Lowe's,etc.). Or fill-in from an electronic flash unit that is off the camera and triggered by either an optical slave, or a radio or infrared-fired remote...something to think about.

The BIG, insulation-board sized reflectors are the easiest to buy and use. For $12.00 you can have an awesome reflector that, when used in a hotel room or other room like this, will bounce-back a LOT of light onto the clothes and model.

Awesome, thanks.

Here's what I mean, some quick crops and conversions out of your originals.

Thanks for the examples, I'll use those as reference points for trying to create something similar. Adding filters and such to these images was something I was always planning to do, but hadn't gotten around to yet.

 

[BrentC]

I'll just comment on adjusting your focal length for your camera. Unfortunately with your camera when you zoom it only tells you in multiples, (1x -30x optical zoom) and does not give you the actual focal length in mm. Although when you look at exif information on your images it tells you the focal length. A few checks on your images you are always shooting at a focal length between 6-10mm.

When people say you should, for portraits, shoot at a fl around 80-150mm this is the 35mm equivalent range. Meaning if you use a full frame DSLR that is the range you would typically use. For example, my camera is M43 not a FF DSLR and has a crop factor of 2x. So for me a fl of 40-75mm is equivalent to 80-150mm on a FF DSLR.

For your camera, that has a 5.6x crop factor it would be different. Your fl range is 4.8-144mm which is equivalent to 27mm-810mm on a DSLR. So if you do the conversion 80-150mm on your camera is 14-27mm. So for 14-27mm is the range you want to shoot in. The images you posted you are shooting equivalent to 33-56mm which too short.

So how do you shoot at a good fl when all your camera displays is Xx optical zoom? 14/4.8=~3 and 27/4.8=~5.6, that means you should be should be shooting between 3x-5.6x optical zoom.

So when you zoom in on the camera you want zoom in until you are between 3x-5.6x. You will have to shoot farther back from the model than you have been.

Hope all these numbers don't confuse you.

 

[Derrel]

This post has muchly improved my (our) understanding of you and your photography. Excellent communication in your writing here ElNico. Wishing you the best of successes!

 

[ElNico]

So when you zoom in on the camera you want zoom in until you are between 3x-5.6x. You will have to shoot farther back from the model than you have been.

Thanks!

This post has muchly improved my (our) understanding of you and your photography.

If you want to "understand me and my photography," then of these three photoshoots, regardless of which one is executed the best, I think that the second one (with Skye) is the most indicative of what I'm at least trying to do.

I agree Migena has a great figure - which I did not ignore when posing her - but the shots overall came out a bit too portrait-like for my taste; which again probably has to do with her seeming preference for more portrait-like mugging, if her portfolio is an indication. Skye's shoot is more in line with what I get a kick out of.

For example, this photo and this photo are both cases of my attempting to execute basically the same pose; but, whatever can be said of their technical execution, the latter is more in line with how I'd like it to look. And not just because of the difference in framing; I'm actually not sure as of yet whether I prefer cropping this pose or not, but Skye's posture and especially her expression are much more my groove. (I would have preferred her arms actually folded though, not just crossed.)

Excellent communication in your writing here ElNico. Wishing you the best of successes!

Thank you. If you don't mind, there are a couple of points in Skye's thread that I'd still greatly appreciate some input on.

 

[Derrel]

[QUOTE="ElNico[/QUOTE] Thank you. If you don't mind, there are a couple of points in Skye's thread that I'd still greatly appreciate some input on.[/QUOTE]

I read that thread, and am not sure what points you'd like input into. There's a lot of stuff that was brought up and discussed. A good deal of advice was throw your way, by multiple members, and I agree with a large part of the things suggested.

One aspect you mentioned was this:

"Skye, for her part, was certainly both willing and able to keep on switching it up (I mentioned above that she would sometimes change poses faster than I could take pictures of them), seems to prefer going with the flow to nitpicking over a small handful of poses without moving on, and appeared to feel that doing otherwise was throwing off her groove. But, I'm beginning to suspect that my "default" approach in fact ought to be the opposite of what she said.

Agree/disagree?"

I am not sure what you mean by opposite of what she said, and the agree/disagree option; that's not fully clear to me, but I do know that sometimes the shoot needs to be controlled, as far as speed of poses and variations of the pose. Speed of the shoot is something the photographer usually needs to control, especially if technical issues are a significant factor, like how fast the strobes recycle, or how fast the proper focus can be achieved, etc.,etc.. I like 3 to 5 seconds between any pose change, due to flash recycle times being 2.5 to 3.5 seconds typically, and I do NOT wanna' see a pose I like "buried in the stack" as a model free-poses past a great look, and dishes out a bunch of half-baked poses. The photographer has a part in the posing and is in direct,100% control over the camera, and personally I think shooting the same pose three to five times, with minor,minor variations makes sense. After three to five frames, then a new pose is fine. The issue as I see it is the type of amateur model type who wants to stand in front of the camera "doing her modeling", which means she expects to run through free-fgorm poses,one after another, and the photographer followers HER lead, and clicks away, with her in control. That's not the way to do it...the camera and lighting determine the speed of the posing. If depth of field is shallow and the focus must be precise, the model has to allow the photographer to achieve precise focus; if the lighting demands precision in subject placement within the lighting pattern,m then the poses absolutely MUST be done slowly enough to achieve the right lighting...the model cannot just "twirl through a routine" she dreams up on the spot.

Anyway...as far as it goes, posing also relates to the overall location and the background. If the model is doing free posing, it can be hard to keep on top of the background. The garbage cans and the open notebooks on the ground...I noticed the notebooks in several shots. I DO however, like to tell a person that they can, as I call it, "free-form pose", for small sections of a shoot, because, well, sometimes that will result in novelo, or unexpected poses, and some people do well with free-form posing, while others people do not. Overall, I like to describe poses and body and head and face and eye directions, buuuut...I'm also open to the idea that, at times, asking the model to be spontaneous can have good results.

I want to be clear: a pose is a basic idea. Small refinements of the pose are still the same pose, but might have slight shifts. This is why 3 to 5 frames per pose makes sense, to me.