Daniel

schumionbike · Jun 20, 2007

I took this picture at my friend 23rd birthday party, yup, that's him right there. He have 3 other siblings that share the same birthday too. All of them are 23 too. lol. He's one of the quad. Comments and critique regarding this "portrait" would be great. Compostion, background, lighting would make great comments :hail:

ShutteredEye · Jun 20, 2007

I might have done some dodging on the teeth, b/c with the super saturated colors you've got, it really pulls out the yellow.

The clutter in the upper left is a tad distracting, but that may have been unavoidable.

Overall, nice shot.

schumionbike · Jun 20, 2007

thanks for the comment and advise, I appreciated!!

NJMAN · Jun 21, 2007

I would make sure the depth of field is more shallow than what you have. That way, if there are any distracting background elements, they are blurred out. There is also an object in back of him that looks like its sticking out of his head. You can either clone that out of this pic, or try another shot with a less distracting background.

On the positive side, I like his expression, and the color and focus is pretty good.

Nice job. Keep posting.

NJ

schumionbike · Jun 21, 2007

Hi NJMAN, thanks very much for the comment and critique. I set my camera to a 2.8 but then when I ended up zoomin in on him and that changed it to a 3.3. I didn't realize that until I look at my exif later. woops. lol.
Dan is a guy with great expressions!!!
Thanks again.

NJMAN · Jun 21, 2007

schumionbike said:
Hi NJMAN, thanks very much for the comment and critique. I set my camera to a 2.8 but then when I ended up zoomin in on him and that changed it to a 3.3. I didn't realize that until I look at my exif later. woops. lol.
Dan is a guy with great expressions!!!
Thanks again.

I would say that f/3.3 is still good for depth of field, but make sure there is enough distance between you and your subject if you are going to zoom in. How close were you standing when taking the shot?

schumionbike · Jun 21, 2007

I don't exactly remember how far I was standing away from him. The zoom was 125 mm. This picture isn't crop at all. I would say I was 5-6 feet away?

NJMAN · Jun 21, 2007

schumionbike said:
I don't exactly remember how far I was standing away from him. The zoom was 125 mm. This picture isn't crop at all. I would say I was 5-6 feet away?

I dont know what the zoom range was on your lens, but try at least 10 feet away, then set the aperture to as wide as it will go (2.8) for the correct exposure, and zoom all the way in. Then, lock the focus on the eyes and shoot. This will give you a nice shallow depth of field. You may need to adjust your ISO for enough light so that your shutter speed isnt too slow, but it looks like you had plenty of light here. All in all, good job though.

schumionbike · Jun 21, 2007

The zoom on camera, Kodak Z710, go from 38-380mm. At the max zoom, I think the lowest aperture will be a 3.7. It can only get a 2.8 at 38mm. So what you're saying is that if I zoom in at 380 with aperture of f2.8, I will get a shallower depth of field than 38 at f2.8 right??

I heard something like this before but wasn't too sure, something like the model and the photographer would stand so far away from each other that they would need a radio to communicate. I wasn't sure the reason why though.

NJMAN · Jun 21, 2007

schumionbike said:
The zoom on camera, Kodak Z710, go from 38-380mm. At the max zoom, I think the lowest aperture will be a 3.7. It can only get a 2.8 at 38mm. So what you're saying is that if I zoom in at 380 with aperture of f2.8, I will get a shallower depth of field than 38 at f2.8 right??

Yes. However, given the fact that you have a digital point and shoot camera, you will have limited control over aperture, shutter speed, and the like depending on your zoom range. I dont have any experience with this particular camera, but it sounds like to me that at the highest end of the zoom (380mm), you will have maxed out on optical zoom, and stepping into the realm of (if not maxing out) digital zoom, which I would NOT recommend. Digital zoom destroys the quality of your image. Not trying to sell you on a better camera here, but any digital SLR will give you MUCH better control over aperture, shutter speed, ISO, etc. than your current camera.

I heard something like this before but wasn't too sure, something like the model and the photographer would stand so far away from each other that they would need a radio to communicate. I wasn't sure the reason why though.

LOL, not sure about the radio communication, but I think you need a little more distance between your subject and you. Like I said, about 10 feet, maybe more. Then max out the optical zoom only, and see where that gets you in terms of depth of field, and quality of image while trying to capture enough composition to make the photo interesting. Photographers are able to get very nice depth field and great bokeh by standing way back and using a nice sharp zoom lens on their subjects (70-200mm for example), or even a good prime lens like 85mm. But it does cost a bit for this type of setup. ;-)

Good luck.

schumionbike · Jun 21, 2007

Thanks NJ, you have been very helpful. I certainly learn something today. My camera does allow for ajusting the aperture, shutter, ISO, exposure mode, things like that but you have to put it in manual mode which I usually do. It also have modes like P,A, and S. Only problem is when it zoom in, it'll change the aperture since it's a pretty cheap len system. The camera does have have 380 optical zoom but at that point, it would have 3.7 aperture rather than 2.8. I would say it's a good camera to learn on but it rather limited in feature such ast the smallest aperture is like f8.0 rather than 22 or 32. Slowest shutterspeed is 8 second and fastest is only 1/1000. The most annoying thing is the highest ISO setting only is 400 and it'll be pretty noisy by then.

Thanks again NJ for all your inputs

tr0gd0o0r · Jun 21, 2007

To put the apertures of your P&S in some perspective, they're really not big numbers for the long end of a zoom. If we were talking about a camera where you buy independent lenses, then you would spend well over 500 for a zoom that is less that 3.7 (and i'm being generous, they're typically over 1,000). So shooing at 3.7 at 380 is actually a pretty decent aperture.

schumionbike · Jun 21, 2007

tr0gd0o0r said:
To put the apertures of your P&S in some perspective, they're really not big numbers for the long end of a zoom. If we were talking about a camera where you buy independent lenses, then you would spend well over 500 for a zoom that is less that 3.7 (and i'm being generous, they're typically over 1,000). So shooing at 3.7 at 380 is actually a pretty decent aperture.

Thanks for the comment, I'm fairly new to photography and the equipment, thanks for letting me know. I won't be looking at DSLR any time soon though, got to finish school first. lol.