My 5 months old daughter

[janineh]

Hi all, I am new here. Just starting off some baby & kids photography and would like some feedback. I took those photos of my 5 months old daughter the other day. Any comments welcome.

 

[PinkDoor]

Lovely! This is a beautiful set, I love the colors, love the expressions. #4 is the winner in this set, but they are all really lovely!

 

[The_Traveler]

these are all sort of out of focus.
You have shot with too short a focal length and the baby's head is distorted by perspective to look large.

 

[janineh]

these are all sort of out of focus.
You have shot with too short a focal length and the baby's head is distorted by perspective to look large.

The eyes and face are sharp. Using a 85 1.4 lens. I did want a lot of bokeh to get the focus on baby's eyes... What focal length would u recommend?

 

[The_Traveler]

these are all sort of out of focus.
You have shot with too short a focal length and the baby's head is distorted by perspective to look large.

The eyes and face are sharp. Using a 85 1.4 lens. I did want a lot of bokeh to get the focus on baby's eyes... What focal length would u recommend?

You are relatively close to the baby's face and the rest of the body is much further away so perspective distortion is almost inevitable from this close.
You have the situation here where the eyes may be in focus but the entire rest of the image is oof and so it looks hazy like she is swimming in fuzz to me.
If you are 8 feet from her shooting on ff with an 85 at 1.4 your dof is total 2 inches; I don't think you need that much bokeh. When things, like forehead hair, that to the viewer's mind should be sharp, are OOF, the impression of general OOF is given.

Shoot at a small f stop f 4 or 5.6 and get enough in focus that the impression of fuzziness isn't given.

I think that the most successful one is the lower row on the right; the baby is framed, the space is filled, there isn't this tiny body stretching off into the distance.

 

[laynea24]

I love them! Your daughter is beautiful!

 

[janineh]

Ok here is a gallery with some more in high res...

http://janineharris.smugmug.com/Children/Luca-5-months-old/23772275_7Mbs2q

 

[janineh]

I love them! Your daughter is beautiful!

Thank you! )

 

[mommy-medic]

I love these! There are two things I would do though- I would clone out the blue thing in the background of the first two, and I would play with the angles a little. It almost looks as if the baby is facing the window directly and the light is falling straight onto her face, causing little to no shadows. I would turn her at a bit of an angle, and shoot so that the light is falling across her face, not directly onto it (so have the window to her left or right), and shoot that way, so you get some definition and depth. The lighting looks good and the catchlights are nice, but I think a little variation on positioning will enhance what you've already got. I'm enjoying your shots- great job!

 

[janineh]

I love these! There are two things I would do though- I would clone out the blue thing in the background of the first two, and I would play with the angles a little. It almost looks as if the baby is facing the window directly and the light is falling straight onto her face, causing little to no shadows. I would turn her at a bit of an angle, and shoot so that the light is falling across her face, not directly onto it (so have the window to her left or right), and shoot that way, so you get some definition and depth. The lighting looks good and the catchlights are nice, but I think a little variation on positioning will enhance what you've already got. I'm enjoying your shots- great job!

Thanks! Great advice!!!