Helpful Little Elf..... Pick one!

[JustJazzie]

We have collected our fair share of ornaments over the years, but this one happens to be my favorite! Found it at a garage sale 7 isn years ago. He is in rough shape, so I tried to clone stamp him up a bit.

I wanted it to look like he was working at night, so I put a gobo in the tree to try and get directional light only from the side of the light bulb he is working on. Now sure how effective that was.

Which crop is better? I like his face in number one showing, but I wasn't sure you could see it was a wrench in his hand/extra bulbs in his pack.
1)

2)

 

[snowbear]

I like the first one - it fills the frame more and I prefer the angle. They are both nice, though.

 

[JustJazzie]

I like the first one - it fills the frame more and I prefer the angle. They are both nice, though.

Thanks! Can you tell what he is doing on the first though? Or would a heavier hand at cropping number two be better?

 

[Fred Berg]

I like the second one, although it's not immediately obvious what is going on: I only noticed the spanner and extra bulbs after reading your response to snowbear.

 

[oldhippy]

like the first one face expression shows better. like the overall definition in 2.

 

[JustJazzie]

Thanks for the valueable feedback everyone! How is this version? I dodged the extra bulb and tried to fill the frame a bit more.

 

[vintagesnaps]

I was thinking in the second one's it's easier to see what he's holding and what he's doing, but the crop brings the viewer in closer to be able to see it better.

What about if you took a photo from a little higher vantage point, could that make it so the wrench would be seen slightly from a different angle to see what it is?

Or move the light and/or him to a different branch?? - we could turn this into a whole big photo shoot, how to pose elves... lol

 

[JustJazzie]

I was thinking in the second one's it's easier to see what he's holding and what he's doing, but the crop brings the viewer in closer to be able to see it better.

What about if you took a photo from a little higher vantage point, could that make it so the wrench would be seen slightly from a different angle to see what it is?

Or move the light and/or him to a different branch?? - we could turn this into a whole big photo shoot, how to pose elves... lol

Do you think he'll look thinner if I shoot from above? Lol

 

[binga63]

1st one

 

[qleak]

Do you think he'll look thinner if I shoot from above? Lol

His body will look thinner, but his face will look larger