Just a few

[katastrophe_katy]

I took these a few weeks ago. SOOC's are obvious, but for the edited ones, I used Photoscape and I used the 'auto level' and 'auto contrast' controls. If I raised the brightness in any of them, I raised it to 50%. In the first one, I used a focal point feature to get the blur effect, although I think I may have gone a bit overboard with it.

 

[bratkinson]

I don't know if you're looking for kudos or a critique.

For my $0.02 worth, I prefer the Photoscape-processed shots to the SOOCs, as there's far more detail visible.

On the critique side, my two issues are that her face is in shadow in the first 4 shots, and that cropping is way too tight.

The shadow on the face is easy to miss when shooting. I find myself doing the same way too often as well. One solution is to use a fill-in flash to put some light on her face. Another would be to increase the exposure by about a stop, perhaps less, but then the risk of blowing out the background details arises. Recognizing the situation as 'back lit' and handling it accordingly comes with practice. I still need more. Most photographers do.

As for the cropping, I'm thinking you cropped the pictures to get them down to the limits of this website for posting. Perhaps Photoscape can reduce the JPG resolution when saving is a better alternative. Just name it something different than the original to prevent its being overwritten. If you're shooting that tight, you need more 'air' around the subject. Cutting off heads is especially frowned upon. How much open space above the subject and to the sides is a personal preference. My preference is about 5-10% airspace above, and about 10-20% airspace left and right. For portraiture types of shots, obviously, there's no airspace below. However, depending on the shot(s), I may increase or decrease 'airspace' as desired. That's the beauty of having a 'darkroom in a box' (computer). I can recompose, re-crop, re-color, re-<anything else> in post processing. Far easier than in a darkroom.

 

[katastrophe_katy]

I don't know if you're looking for kudos or a critique.

For my $0.02 worth, I prefer the Photoscape-processed shots to the SOOCs, as there's far more detail visible.

On the critique side, my two issues are that her face is in shadow in the first 4 shots, and that cropping is way too tight.

The shadow on the face is easy to miss when shooting. I find myself doing the same way too often as well. One solution is to use a fill-in flash to put some light on her face. Another would be to increase the exposure by about a stop, perhaps less, but then the risk of blowing out the background details arises. Recognizing the situation as 'back lit' and handling it accordingly comes with practice. I still need more. Most photographers do.

As for the cropping, I'm thinking you cropped the pictures to get them down to the limits of this website for posting. Perhaps Photoscape can reduce the JPG resolution when saving is a better alternative. Just name it something different than the original to prevent its being overwritten. If you're shooting that tight, you need more 'air' around the subject. Cutting off heads is especially frowned upon. How much open space above the subject and to the sides is a personal preference. My preference is about 5-10% airspace above, and about 10-20% airspace left and right. For portraiture types of shots, obviously, there's no airspace below. However, depending on the shot(s), I may increase or decrease 'airspace' as desired. That's the beauty of having a 'darkroom in a box' (computer). I can recompose, re-crop, re-color, re-<anything else> in post processing. Far easier than in a darkroom.

I didn't crop it in my program, if that's what you mean. I zoomed in on my camera. Should I not zoom in, and just keep it at it's automatic setting? I use the AI feature. I don't know how to use manual or aperture settings, so I go with the easiest for me. I always have my flash open because they come out clearer, but if it's bright outside, it won't go off. I LOVE close up pictures (are those called portraits??) so that's why I zoom in (which is why the top of her head is cut off, sometimes it works for me and sometimes it just doesn't look right), and I don't want to be too far away from my subject and then the crop (if/when I do crop) be too grainy to use. Does that make sense?