First Ever Senior Portrait Shoot C&C Welcome

Cyotheking · Aug 28, 2013

These are a few photos from my first ever senior portrait shoot and would love to see what people like/she think I could have done better.

Designer · Aug 28, 2013

I like #1 & #2, but #3 probably should include more of his upper torso.
#4 not keen on it.

tirediron · Aug 28, 2013

C&C per req:

1. Nice shot, good 'cool' pose & expression. I'm not much fussed about the 'vignette' effect upper left, and the image does need leveling. I wish you'd used a reflector or fill-flash to put a little light into his eyes, and NOT your on-camera speedlight. Remember, the hot shoe on your camera is ONLY there to support a remote trigger!

2. I see where you were going here, but IMO, it didn't work. The sky is totally blown and featureless, his face is grossly underexposed, and his arms & legs? They look jaundiced! This is another image where a single OCF would have saved the day. Even a big reflector would have helped. A LOT!

3. I don't get the placement of his face in the image, and while it's not the end of the world to crop the top of someone's head, but the crop on the chin really hurts the image IMO.

4. Based on the angle of his head, I would prefer him to have been placed on the LH side of the image, and I think this one, with a bit more road in the image, and a LOT less DoF would have been a great shot for monochrome.

Overall, they're not a bad set by any means. The ideas are good, but the overall execution suffers due to a lack of technical expertise.

Just my $00.02 worth - your mileage may vary.

~John

nycphotography · Aug 28, 2013

#1 the lighting just didn't really work. Needed some kind of fill... a white bounce card, some fill flash.. something.

#2 and #4 you can't see his face.

#3 and #1 he's squinty eyed.

For me, I don't see a keeper in the set. In #1, if his eyes were open, I'd maybe work in layers in PS and try to bring the exposure on him up relative to the background. Well, maybe if these are what I have, I'd still see what I could do with it as it's your best chance.

good ideas, but the execution needs to be better.

For future reference, when I'm getting squinty eyes, I generally have the model close their eyes... then open them wide and "find me" on command... and thats when I shoot. sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

thebasedsloth · Aug 28, 2013

Everyone pretty much covered everything.
Only thing I'm gonna say is how big was the puddle in front of him in #4?
If his whole reflection was in it, you should have taken advantage!

Cyotheking · Aug 28, 2013

Hmm...guess I'm a bit disappointed to know that most of these turned out badly. Gotta learn some how I guess. I supposed my editing has a ways to go.

Was #1 Really underexposed that badly? To me I don't see anything that's underexposed.

Thanks for all the critiques everyone! I'll keep them in mind next time.

thebasedsloth said:
Everyone pretty much covered everything.
Only thing I'm gonna say is how big was the puddle in front of him in #4?
If his whole reflection was in it, you should have taken advantage!

I actually did do a photo with the reflection

thebasedsloth · Aug 28, 2013

Ooh! Much cooler! Still looks a little dark and could use some more vibrance or something

tirediron · Aug 28, 2013

It's not so much that #1 was under-exposed, but rather that it wasn't optimally exposed. You used an on-camera speedlight which resulted in pin-point, centre-of-the-eye catchlights and red-eye, neither of which are generally regarded as flattering, whereas had you moved the flash off to camera right, or used a nice big reflector, you would have added some real 'life' to his eyes.

Cyotheking · Aug 28, 2013

thebasedsloth said:
Ooh! Much cooler! Still looks a little dark and could use some more vibrance or something

I had actually tried playing with the vibrance and bringing up the exposure a little bit. The photo seemed to get messy really fast.

nycphotography · Aug 28, 2013

Ah much better for a senior picture. You can see his face, which for this genre is critical.

And he's not squinting.

Unfortunately, it appears to be out of focus?

Cyotheking · Aug 28, 2013

tirediron said:
It's not so much that #1 was under-exposed, but rather that it wasn't optimally exposed. You used an on-camera speedlight which resulted in pin-point, centre-of-the-eye catchlights and red-eye, neither of which are generally regarded as flattering, whereas had you moved the flash off to camera right, or used a nice big reflector, you would have added some real 'life' to his eyes.

Hmm. I'll have to try a reflector at my next shoot. Do you have any advice for using a reflector? I've never used one before.

nycphotography said:
Ah much better for a senior picture. You can see his face, which for this genre is critical.

And he's not squinting.

Unfortunately, it appears to be out of focus?

Hmm...Seems like focus was messed up some where in that.

I really don't get how I missed things like this during my editing. Worked on them for over a week constantly checking for any errors.

tirediron · Aug 28, 2013

There really isn't much to using a reflector, just make sure that it's big enough (the 42" 5 in 1 are a good, general purpose type), have your assistant hold it to catch the sunlight and slowly move it around until you get the light on the subject the way that you want it.