Have at it.

[IronMaskDuval]

By no means am I a pro or claim to be. It's a bit of a hobby. Tips, tricks and pointers? I know. I placed her where the sun made her squint.

 

[NedM]

Nice

 

[runnah]

She has a tree growing out of the top of her head and her elbows and arms are cut off. Also the background isn't interesting enough to take up so much real estate.

 

[charlie76]

She has a tree growing out of the top of her head and her elbows and arms are cut off. Also the background isn't interesting enough to take up so much real estate.

Yup

 

[IronMaskDuval]

She has a tree growing out of the top of her head and her elbows and arms are cut off. Also the background isn't interesting enough to take up so much real estate.

Thanks, runnah. I should know better than to have something grow from her head. How noobish of me? As for the background, she built that green house and works the land around it. I know the blur doesn't tell much of a story, but I was trying to follow the law of thirds. Advise?

 

[charlie76]

If the greenhouse is the thing behind her...I'd suggest moving her to the other side so you get a little balance.

 

[IronMaskDuval]

If the greenhouse is the thing behind her...I'd suggest moving her to the other side so you get a little balance.

Thanks. I think that's money! Did I just say that? The only reason why I didn't from the get go is because any more to the other side of the fence and she's at the gate, which I didn't think was aesthetic enough to place into the picture-- not that a tree growing out of her head is.

 

[Derrel]

She has a tree growing out of the top of her head and her elbows and arms are cut off. Also the background isn't interesting enough to take up so much real estate.

And not just "a tree", but the largest-diameter, blackest, meanest, nastiest one in the whole patch of woods behind her...see how over in the middle of the frame the trees are smaller, and more out of focus and lighter, and less intrusive? Over to the left of the frame, right up above where the darkest fencepost in the chainlink fence is a good, slightly out of focus gathering of trees, right in-between ther two darker, bigger trees...now THAT location could easily fit her head in between the trees, and maybe it would work better.

Now, except for the arms resting on the table not being shown, and being cut off by the edge of the frame, I really LIKE her wry expression, and the over the shoulder, angled sunlight is used pretty well in this B&W conversion. The shadow that her cheek casts, and the excellent highlight on her forehead, and the fairly good amount of light on her whole face, makes this actually a pretty well-done "reality shot" type of exposure. Yeah, the light is strong, and highly directional, but this really says, "Nice day during late winter weather." I'd disagree that the background is not interesting to take up a lot of space, since I see this as a sort of "backyard environmental portraiture" effort. But yes, eliminating at least some of the background would probably be a good idea.

The LIGHT there was good. I really wish maybe you had stepped over 5 steps, and moved back a ways and used a longer lens, to narrow the background a bit, and to lower the DOF on the background. But her expression, pose, and all, pretty good, really. The "situation" and the light, and the woman are ALL very appealing, very nice...but I would have loved to see her dark shirt contrasted aginst the light colored yard and chain link, more in the middle of the frame, and minus the most-prominent tree sprouting out of the top of her head. Just a little bit more movement of the camera to the right, or having her scooch over to the left maybe 4 feet would have been an inside the park home run, or at least a stand-up triple, I think.

 

[manaheim]

Agree with previous comments. Just tossing in my support.

 

[IronMaskDuval]

She has a tree growing out of the top of her head and her elbows and arms are cut off. Also the background isn't interesting enough to take up so much real estate.

And not just "a tree", but the largest-diameter, blackest, meanest, nastiest one in the whole patch of woods behind her...see how over in the middle of the frame the trees are smaller, and more out of focus and lighter, and less intrusive? Over to the left of the frame, right up above where the darkest fencepost in the chainlink fence is a good, slightly out of focus gathering of trees, right in-between ther two darker, bigger trees...now THAT location could easily fit her head in between the trees, and maybe it would work better.

Now, except for the arms resting on the table not being shown, and being cut off by the edge of the frame, I really LIKE her wry expression, and the over the shoulder, angled sunlight is used pretty well in this B&W conversion. The shadow that her cheek casts, and the excellent highlight on her forehead, and the fairly good amount of light on her whole face, makes this actually a pretty well-done "reality shot" type of exposure. Yeah, the light is strong, and highly directional, but this really says, "Nice day during late winter weather." I'd disagree that the background is not interesting to take up a lot of space, since I see this as a sort of "backyard environmental portraiture" effort. But yes, eliminating at least some of the background would probably be a good idea.

The LIGHT there was good. I really wish maybe you had stepped over 5 steps, and moved back a ways and used a longer lens, to narrow the background a bit, and to lower the DOF on the background. But her expression, pose, and all, pretty good, really. The "situation" and the light, and the woman are ALL very appealing, very nice...but I would have loved to see her dark shirt contrasted aginst the light colored yard and chain link, more in the middle of the frame, and minus the most-prominent tree sprouting out of the top of her head. Just a little bit more movement of the camera to the right, or having her scooch over to the left maybe 4 feet would have been an inside the park home run, or at least a stand-up triple, I think.

Thanks, Darrel. That's exactly the feedback that I was looking for, and it's the reason why I'm here. As I am reading the feedback from everyone, I'm not even thinking about changing the position of where I stand. I'm thinking about where I should put her, which makes the compo relatively more difficult. Nice feedback and definitely an experience to place into my book.

And Darrel, what kind of longer lens should I be looking at? The 50mm 1.8 or the 85mm 1.8?

 

[Derrel]

Thanks, Darrel. That's exactly the feedback that I was looking for, and it's the reason why I'm here. As I am reading the feedback from everyone, I'm not even thinking about changing the position of where I stand. I'm thinking about where I should put her, which makes the compo relatively more difficult. Nice feedback and definitely an experience to place into my book.

I was told once by a master commercial photographer that he liked to take his camera and walk around with it and a semi-wide angle lens on it and look for a, "Great place to position the camera to get an interesting background, and THEN figure out the best way to bring the subject into position." He did a lot of corporate annual report stuff, so that totally makes sense...in a way, that genre is often about "places", with the people sort of being used as props. Sure, you focus on the people in the foreground, but you're trying to "show off the place" too.

Like her self-built greenhouse, and the fence, and the small patch of woods...to me, all that stuff that is "her environment". This shot is so,so close to being a big success.

 

[charlie76]

I was told once by a master commercial photographer that he liked to take his camera and walk around with it and a semi-wide angle lens on it and look for a, "Great place to position the camera to get an interesting background, and THEN figure out the best way to bring the subject into position." He did a lot of corporate annual report stuff, so that totally makes sense...in a way, that genre is often about "places", with the people sort of being used as props. Sure, you focus on the people in the foreground, but you're trying to "show off the place" too. Like her self-built greenhouse, and the fence, and the small patch of woods...to me, all that stuff that is "her environment". This shot is so,so close to being a big success.

All hail Derrel...the master commenter. Or at least the fastest typist.

 

[JacaRanda]

And, maybe have her push her glasses up on her face/nose so that they don't block any of her left eye.

Never would have noticed that if I were behind the camera.

 

[vintagesnaps]

I don't think you need to necessarily get another lens at this point, you can see what you can do better with what you have - move your feet, they're not glued to the ground (unless your yard is really muddy! lol). Walk around and see what background you get in your viewfinder or on your viewscreen (you could do that without a subject/person before you get set up to take the photo, and you don't have to release the shutter, look and think about what you see).

The greenhouse could be interesting in the scene, it's a matter of where you put it and where you put her - if you move and change your vantage point you can 'move' objects around in your viewfinder and put them where you want them (within limits of where you can stand etc.). The so-called rule of thirds is more of a guideline that can help give some good balance to an image, if you're going to use that instead of her right arm I'd put her face 1/3 of the way from the right side of the frame.

I wonder if the contrast needs some adjustment, and it almost looks borderline purplish grayish, is there still some RBG in it or is it totally grayscale?

Her face is the best part of the picture, you could make copies and try cropping and see what you can do to improve the balance and composition - it would be better seeing her forearms but as-is I might try cropping the bottom a little to eliminate the edges and then crop the left side to get rid of some of the background and see how it looks.

 

[IronMaskDuval]

I don't think you need to necessarily get another lens at this point, you can see what you can do better with what you have - move your feet, they're not glued to the ground (unless your yard is really muddy! lol). Walk around and see what background you get in your viewfinder or on your viewscreen (you could do that without a subject/person before you get set up to take the photo, and you don't have to release the shutter, look and think about what you see).

The greenhouse could be interesting in the scene, it's a matter of where you put it and where you put her - if you move and change your vantage point you can 'move' objects around in your viewfinder and put them where you want them (within limits of where you can stand etc.). The so-called rule of thirds is more of a guideline that can help give some good balance to an image, if you're going to use that instead of her right arm I'd put her face 1/3 of the way from the right side of the frame.

I wonder if the contrast needs some adjustment, and it almost looks borderline purplish grayish, is there still some RBG in it or is it totally grayscale?

Her face is the best part of the picture, you could make copies and try cropping and see what you can do to improve the balance and composition - it would be better seeing her forearms but as-is I might try cropping the bottom a little to eliminate the edges and then crop the left side to get rid of some of the background and see how it looks.

The color is from a color gradient screen. I'll take a shot at the crop.