Looking for more C&C please

ahcigar1 · Sep 2, 2012

Went out for another trial photo shoot yesterday. Didn't get very much before she just went postal. But did manage to get 2 decent ones. I bumped my F stop from 1.8 and 2.8 up to 4. Also fixed the focus on my camera. Turns out it was front focusing just slightly. Please let me know how I did this time and how I can continue to improve? I realize on the second photo I clipped off part of her head. I do need to work on that.

MLeeK · Sep 2, 2012

#1 The exposure looks good, Focus is great as she's almost a flat plane to your camera. Her eyes are a bit over done at this size. Color looks great. Composition is pretty decent. You are trying to use the RO3 in a proper way. The little bit of her arm leads you out, but it doesn't really bother me. The grass is nicely dark and blurred to keep it from distracting

Your DOF in the second one is still a bit too short. The sharpest focus is on the outside edge of the eye closest us. You want to lock on the INSIDE corner of the eye.
It's a bit yellower than the first and does not have the same amount of contrast. Exposure looks OK. You are lacking the contrast that the first has in it.
The composition has some issues with the bits of fingers popping up in there and the head reaching out of the edge. You've used the RO3 in this one again and it would work very well if you had included more. back up a bit and include all of the arm and hand that is reaching into your negative space-which would probably result in both arms.
Cutting off or leaving bits in the image kind of hurt it a bit.

cgipson1 · Sep 2, 2012

try shooting vertically maybe, and not so tight? Unless you just like all that green dead space that doesn't add to the photo?

ahcigar1 · Sep 2, 2012

Thank you for the info MLeeK. May I ask what RO3 stands for? I'm not very good with abbreviations. I realize that I need to back up a bit in both of the photos. It is a habit that I really need to work on breaking. How can I help on the focus in the 2nd image more but still keep the background blurred nicely?

ahcigar1 · Sep 2, 2012

cgipson1 said:
try shooting vertically maybe, and not so tight? Unless you just like all that green dead space that doesn't add to the photo?

Yes you are right I do need to work more on shooting portrait rather than landscape. Landscape is what I generally shoot about 95% of the time with doing mostly landscape as well as horses so my mind automatically thinks in that way.

cgipson1 · Sep 2, 2012

RO3 is rule of thirds!

Bokeh is a combination of several things.. lens is important, but subject distance to camera, and subject distance to background is probably more important to you! For the second shot... you need to be on her level, and ensure that the background is about two or three times farther away than the distance of subject to camera. Then you can stop down a bit F4 or F5.6, and still keep the background "blurred".

This may be helpful Online Depth of Field Calculator. Anything within the DOF field will be sharp.. anything outside it will get progressively "blurrier"

MLeeK · Sep 2, 2012

ahcigar1 said:
Thank you for the info MLeeK. May I ask what RO3 stands for? I'm not very good with abbreviations. I realize that I need to back up a bit in both of the photos. It is a habit that I really need to work on breaking. How can I help on the focus in the 2nd image more but still keep the background blurred nicely?

Rule of thirds

paigew · Sep 2, 2012

I was totally lost on what RO3 meant as well :lol:

I agree that these need to be vertical and that you need to back (way) up. You should easily be able to get your daughter focused with an fstop of 3.2-4. And honestly the eye 2nd image doesn't look too soft imo. I would try to get your fp in between the eyes next time. I also think they are a little cool and her skin tone is blueish in the first one.

The_Traveler · Sep 2, 2012

Something that I do with shots of babies with fair skin shot outside.
Outside light is colder than one would like.
I use color info from the white part of their eyes and balance their until it is only very slightly blue (using info and looking at rgb levels)
I did that and then the skin looked a tiny bit magenta so I decreased that with a color balance layer.
I have no idea if it is my eyes or my monitor but this color looks better to me.

ahcigar1 · Sep 2, 2012

The color in the first one does look slightly off. Traveler your balance correction looks correct. I edited these when my monitor was not calibrated for about a month. Big mistake. I calibrated it again just now and I see that the skin tone in the first image is a bit cool.