Laurajean in bw.

[ronlane]

Here is one that I took at a photowalk this week. I thought it was good in color but I think I like the b/w version a little better.

 

[DarkShadow]

Wow She is stunning and what a great shot nice in black and white.Love this.

 

[Jeff1550 50]

Excellent image...

 

[Dean_Gretsch]

Those Okie gals are still just as beautiful as I remember! Great shot sir!

 

[OldManJim]

nice composition!

 

[ronlane]

Wow She is stunning and what a great shot nice in black and white.Love this.

Thank you.

Excellent image...

Thank you.

Those Okie gals are still just as beautiful as I remember! Great shot sir!

Thank you, yeah there are a few of them around here.

nice composition!

Thank you.

 

[bulldurham6 1]

I have two issues with this image and while the subject is pretty well lit, the pose makes it appear if she is supporting her head with her left hand, presumably, and I am just speculating, to keep her from sliding out of the frame because of the pronounced slant to the horizon. I critique this because I think there is great potential to your shooting but it's the little things like this that will keep you off the winner's podium.

Next time, check that horizon line and then have her do something with that arm and hand that makes sense...pull some more hair off her left side and let her hand either slide through the strands or be pulling a strand up whimsically, but something other than as a head prop.

Cheers.

 

[ronlane]

I have two issues with this image and while the subject is pretty well lit, the pose makes it appear if she is supporting her head with her left hand, presumably, and I am just speculating, to keep her from sliding out of the frame because of the pronounced slant to the horizon. I critique this because I think there is great potential to your shooting but it's the little things like this that will keep you off the winner's podium.

Next time, check that horizon line and then have her do something with that arm and hand that makes sense...pull some more hair off her left side and let her hand either slide through the strands or be pulling a strand up whimsically, but something other than as a head prop.

Cheers.

Thank you @bulldurham for the c&c. I appreciate the good and the issues that you have brought up. These are things that I will be able to use in the future. While it may appear that she is supporting her head with that hand, she is not. The spot that she is laying is pretty level, as it is man made. I also do not see the slant you are referring to. To me there is no clear horizon line in this image, as I shot it. Now I will say that I was not on a tripod and did not use the level in the camera but it was shot pretty close to level. This image is cropped just a little and I used the auto level as I cropped.

 

[bulldurham6 1]

I was predicating most of my response on (for me) the unnaturalness of her left hand doing "nothing." There is a clear horizon line but I am looking at your image from a viewer's response and you are still seeing it as you shot it...but as I am clearly demonstrating, there is a pronounced "slant" to the horizon, thus my rather odd declaration of her slipping out of the frame. Cheers

 

[smoke665]

am clearly demonstrating, there is a pronounced "slant" to the horizon

Could this possibly be caused by perspective making the subject appear level, but horizon slanting?

 

[tirediron]

I agree with BD about the slanting horizon (water level of the pond/stream image right), but I don't agree that it needs to be leveled. I think this is one of those cases where the image needs to "look right" rather than be correct, and in my mind, that's about half-way between the original and BD's edit.

 

[ronlane]

Thanks everyone. I will pull it back up in LR and give it a look this evening to see.

 

[bulldurham6 1]

If you level it to "correct" then the model's arm doesn't appear to be just holding her head up. I am so weird about straightened horizons, that I guess it gets in the way of being purely objective about the intent.

 

[Derrel]

It's interesting. I saw the same woman (same dress,same location!) photographed by another photographer on another forum just yesterday, and he had a very awkward crop of her near her knee. Someone said that a full-length pose would have been better, and your photo demonstrates that that is indeed the case. As far as the horizon, ponds and lakes often have a rather circular shape, and I believe the horizon is actually correct and right. Look at the tree trunk on the left side of the frame, and ignore the lake's shoreline...the shore of a lake is NOT in any way, always a good way to determine the levelness of the camera.

 

[vintagesnaps]

I think the pose is somewhat awkward, but on a photo walk it's likely shots are set up for the group and you aren't the one setting it up. To me she looks like a cross between trying to look sexy and being uncomfortable sitting that way (leaning back w/one arm up bent). I would have had her check/arrange her hair; there's one odd section sticking up that should've been combed/tucked into place. (Every time she moved so did her hair.)

I think it's fairly straight because look at the reflection in the water of some rectangular thing - it looks parallel to the side of the frame/image to the right. I taught myself shooting hockey to frame shots making sure posts near center ice were parallel to one side or the other of the frame when looking thru the viewfinder (because the ice usually doesn't have a sharp horizontal line and it curves at each end). So I often do that, look for something vertical to line up properly in the frame. This looks fine as far as being straight (I didn't measure it, just eyeballing it, but if needs adjustment it's not much).

edit - I looked again, and those rocks seem on a slope; that and instead of being seated on her bottom the way we usually sit, she's back on her tailbone. That and when she positioned her hand, that bunched up her hair enough to need to stop and arrange/comb the hair. That's the kind of thing that's necessary to see before taking the photo (as the saying goes, the devil's in the details).

And since that was probably out of your control, you got a nice photo, the critique to me is more about the posing/styling. She's framed nicely by the leaves and I think this works in B&W.

 

[ronlane]

Here is the new crop to straighten it up some.