First "Portrait" shoot

BmDubb · Oct 18, 2009

Decided to try to finally take some "People" photos. The subject was my 3 year old son ( Landon ). He was a good sport about being a model ( And he was acting like a model to LOL )

Anyways, heres my first attempt. CC Welcome
Thanks

tirediron · Oct 18, 2009

C&C per req:

A nice first attempt, but I see a couple of areas that could be improved. First, always avoid having things 'grow' out of the back of your subjects head such as these bushes. This isn't such an extreme case as say, having a telephone pole immediately behind the subject, but it is a little distracting. Next, unless we can see what's so interesting, it's usually best to have the subject look toward the camera (This is a point on which fashion and portraiture disagree, so if you were going for a 'fashion' look, ignore this). Not necessarily right at it, but toward it, and lastly lighting needs a little work. I'm guessing you used on-camera flash for a fill? Better than nothing but only just. I think a simple reflector to camera left (note the dark shadows on his shirt on his right side) would have been all that was needed.

On a technical note, why shoot this at 1/200 @ f10? Using your long glass and a larger aperture, you could have rendered a nice, softly focused and less distracting background.

Just my $00.02 worth - your mileage may vary

~John

BmDubb · Oct 18, 2009

Thanks tired.. Like I said, this is my first attempt at this style so I was kind of just playing with the settings. Unfortunately at this time all I have is the on camera flash, so Im workin with what I got.. I will be trying some more shots soon. Thanks for lookin and CC :thumbup:

c.cloudwalker · Oct 18, 2009

I agree with tirediron comment on the bushes. You actually almost lose the spiky hair to the greenery. Plus, it is not the most interesting background.

Light wise, I am a bit confused by what I'm seeing. Where was the sun? Where was your flash?

BmDubb · Oct 18, 2009

There was no sun in this shot.. It was kind of hanging out to the east a bit lol. Anyways, heres another shot I took.. Thought he looked a little depressed in this one lol

CC on this one is appreciated as well.

c.cloudwalker · Oct 18, 2009

Much better. I would burn in his face and neck just a bit and that's it.

BmDubb · Oct 18, 2009

These look better?

PS'ed some of the branches out from around the head also took some of the shadows of the coat

Darkend ( Burned ) the face and neck

syphlix · Oct 18, 2009

last tree one you ps'ed makes his skin look really blotchy...

the bush one i would just toss and not bother trying to PS it...

the tree one is a lot better than the bush one... but it's still not that great cuz his hair just blends in w/ the bark... why not try a "portrait" farther away from a clean, non-distracting background that you blur out using DOF...

also, try sticking him under open shade for the lighting instead of using the onboard flash...

SpeedTrap · Oct 18, 2009

The fact that you photoshpped the background just looks a bit off, it looks like you used a lower resolution file for the background.

BmDubb · Oct 18, 2009

The only thing I did to the sky picture was clonestamp out some of the brush behind his head... The setup was him standing on the doghouse, the brush right behind him.. I thought it would look cool with the deep blue sky...and green shrubbery as a background. I see it is a bit busy.. but I still like it.. Its my first attempt, so I guess it could be worse.. but definitely could be better

Thanks so much guys!

tnvol · Oct 18, 2009

BmDubb said:
There was no sun in this shot.. It was kind of hanging out to the east a bit lol. Anyways, heres another shot I took.. Thought he looked a little depressed in this one lol

CC on this one is appreciated as well.

lol He looks like he is in "time out". lol Nice pic though. Good job!