Do you have the time?

[Richard]

This photo is a picture of my Brother-In-Law who has a learning disability. One of his obsessions is time, and he loves clocks as you can see. I wanted to capture this obsession of his. Any other time I take pictures he is the one to hide but when I told him about this picture he gave me the okay, and I think he was proud to display his clocks.

Please give me a General Critical Analysis.

 

[elsaspet]

Very nice complete photo.
I'm gonna give you the "harder" crit, because I think that's what you are ready for.

A low (floor) angle could have been better......making him smaller, and the clocks larger.

I'm not sure I love the black and white. This almost begs for color......to show the variety of the clocks.

I'd love to see him looking at the clocks....not at you. It's about the clocks, not the photog/subject.

The grate in the upper right 1/3 should go because it is competing.

Now, that sounds pretty harsh.........it's really just nit picking to give you other options. It's really a very interesting photograph. But, IMO, I think it could be a killer photo.
Good job!

 

[Kimber57]

I don't know about critical, but I love the repetition of the circles in the clocks AS WELL AS the double wedding ring quilt on the bed. I don't know if you did that on purpose, but it is really cool. I love the picture.

 

[abraxas]

Shots with humans in them are a bit out of my league, but I'm wondering, is he balancing that clock on his head? My son doesn't like the peas on his dinner plate touching his potatoes. Now I know where he got it- heads touching clocks bother me the same way.

(BTW, I used to have a collection of about 3 dozen cheap alarm clocks. I liked the ticking. It didn't take long to figure out to only set the one next to the bed though.)

 

[Richard]

elsaspet,

Thank you elsaspet for your critique.

My camera was low I may have been 1 foot from the floor, I didn’t angle it higher because I was afraid of getting too much ceiling in the picture, and I was worried about getting a shot up the nose. Is a shot up the nose not relevant at my distance from him? Or maybe if he is not looking at the camera you won’t get a shot up the nose? Now the shot was cropped a little which may be why it doesn’t give the low angle you are talking about. I had some distracting elements that prevented a wider shot, but I believe I can hide/remove most of those elements.

A lot of his clocks are exactly the same or very similar, black rims. So there really wasn’t many different colors. I will post the color version anyway so you can compare later tonight.

I would like to try a few shots with him looking at the clocks. I had him put on a wrist watch and I took a few shots of him looking at it, but they didn’t come out the way I thought they would. But I didn’t try it with this composition.

As far as the grate I noticed that too, and I should have taken that out.

I’m going to try to do a re-shoot, I feel the same way you do, there is a killer picture to be found. Thank you again I am going to try some of the suggestions you mentioned.

As far as the re-shoot what do you think about adding clocks? I mean this photo only shows about half of the clocks that he has. I thought I could line up some clocks along the bottom of the bed on the side facing the camera. That would take out the ugly metal frame legs of the bed and I will be able to get a wider shot.

Kimber57,

No I didn’t do that on purpose, but great observation. Thanks for the comments.

abraxas,

I agree the clock touching his head seems wrong. When I got home and pulled the pictures up on the computer I noticed I had a few shots of him right dab in the middle of two clocks by his head, which gave him really big Mickey Mouse ears! I was thinking about having him sit on the floor to avoid having clocks anywhere near his head, what do you think? Thanks for the comments.

 

[elsaspet]

Hi Richard,
I'm just looking from this as a photojournalist.
You might be right about the higher angle and the roof. In fact, yep, you are right. Keep it like it is.
I still think color would be 10 times the impact. I'd really like to see it that way, and yes, I think him in his natural surrounds, less the photographer element is KEY. Just sit in a corner and have him try to ignore you. It will seem like forever, but eventually he will get bored and he will stop noticing you are there. That's gonna be the moment, IMO.

 

[abraxas]

Maybe a little higher pov and him setting his watch by a clock in his lap? This would get his head bent down a bit without getting a shot of the back of him or side. -maybe. I'm going back to trees and rocks.

 

[The_Traveler]

I would try a shot where his head in in line with a line of clocks so that the clocks fill the frame around his head and shoulders with as little else in the frame as possible.

 

[Richard]

abraxas,
No that seems like a good idea, my wife actually said that the day of the shoot, too have him setting a clock... I forgot to do it, hey it was either that or I forget to put the trash up front. I never win.


The_Traveler,
If I understand you correctly I think that would be an interesting shot, and I will try that also.

Okay here is the color version, I may need to bring the exposure up a third of a stop or so.

Thanks again for all the comments.

 

[elsaspet]

I'm agreeing with Traveler here. I think a nice crop would work well, just smashing him in there with all the clocks. I like the color version too.

 

[Kimber57]

OH, I like the color version better, as well. Again, it shows the circles in the quilt better. I know the quilt is not the focus of the picture, but it sure does add to the overall makeup of the picture. Lovely!

(yes, I'm a quilter)

 

[abraxas]

I like the B&W concept better. Maybe with more contrast though.

 

[Unmanedpilot]

I like the B&W version as well. The color is spread throughout the photo making the image seem slightly unbalanced to me.

I'm with abraxas, I don't do a lot of portraits of people so I have no idea how to place them in a picture!

 

[just x joey]

I'd love to see him looking at the clocks....not at you. It's about the clocks, not the photog/subject.

i disagree, i think its about the subject AND his clocks. I wuldnt liek it if he was looking at the clocks probably. also the black and white is best here, just bump the contrast.

 

[Jeff Colburn]

I like the picture, and that it's in black and white. However, (Oh come on, you knew it was coming) I wouldn't have cropped the bottom like you did. I would have cropped just below his shoes instead of below mid-shin. Also, there is no white, white in the image. It's a little muddy. Make the white pop and you have a winner.

Have Fun,
Jeff