First engagement shoot. CC please

[Mcarlson]

My first shoot, just as favor to sister-in-law. These have not yet been edited, suggestions for editing and overall CC.
Thank you.

 

[Studio7Four]

C&C per request:

As a first engagement shoot it's not bad, and I suspect they're happy with the result. I do have some general suggestions...
- I'm guessing (because their hats were coordinated) that the hats have some significance to the couple. However, without judiciously applied fill flash or a reflector, you get shadowing of the eyes which takes away from their connection with the viewer. Personally I like to see engagement photos in which the couple are locked on each other and not interacting with the camera, but if they are going to look at the camera you want to catch their eyes.
- These are framed pretty tightly. Particularly in the first and fourth, if these are printed for framing the frame is likely going to obscure some of their heads.
- I like where you were going with the shallow depth of focus on the fourth, but a) the pose (sticking her arm straight out) looks uncomfortable, and b) the ring is still such a small portion of the frame that it doesn't have the impact you were going for. A tweak to this pose would be to have his arm out as well, supporting her hand (think of the extended arms of a ballroom dancing couple). You could also have brought the arm in for a more comfortable position, and gotten in much closer to the ring - it would be a bigger portion of the frame and you still would have a shallow DoF to blur their faces.
- The handwritten note on the rough-edged brown paper is unorthodox, but I kind of like it.

Just my $.02.

 

[cgipson1]

Need fill under those hats... Badly! Shooting in heavy shade without fill flash, makes for poor color, and no "POP"!

 

[Memorylanephotos]

Not bad for a start. I encounted issues like these dark areas under the hat and around the eyes. A friend of mine who is 75 Years old and shot over 5000 weddings in his life taught me one thing for sure. Flash fill on 100% of all images shot. I always use flash fill and then drop my exposure down a stop and it gives clean fill light without being over blown. Just my opinion. But remember your opinion is what matters. Thanks for allowing me to view your work.

 

[412 Burgh]

I agree the shadows from the hat don't do the pictures justice. Their faces are what important in these pictures and their not highly visible because of the above mentioned. Shadows casted by their hats.

 

[Mcarlson]

Thank you for the advice. I definately need a fill flash. The hats were a bit of a suprise for me. And I do need to work on my framing.

 

[kathyt]

Not bad at all. I would start with your WB. Then I would see where you are at from there. Really cute captures though.

 

[hirejn]

Technically you need some exposure improvements and better color, but I've seen those images from other photographers -- the ideas.

 

[The_Traveler]

 

[DiskoJoe]

Need fill under those hats... Badly! Shooting in heavy shade without fill flash, makes for poor color, and no "POP"!

I was thinking exactly the same thing.

 

[Mcarlson]

Thank you for taking the time for editing. They were all a little on the dark side. Your photograph, btw is one of my favorites I've seen.

 

[Stolarczyk]

It's pretty good for a first attempt, so I think you can feel satisfied in that. The need of fill light under the hats has already been covered, so I won't go into detail with that. The background is almost blowing out at times though, and your subjects are underexposed. I assume you shot them in shade to give them more even shadows, but you almost exposed in the middle so nothing is exactly at the exposure it should be. Either watch for how bright your background is, or bring in some fill light to your subjects to try and balance the scene.