Not candid but totally spontaneous portraits

[LaFoto]

...of my favourite "model": Sabine, my daughter

They were all unplanned and unprepared, we were visiting with my father-in-law (for the "fire in the drum", among other things, which can be seen here) and sitting outside on his roofed verandah having coffee and cakes - and I "ruined the moment" by weilding about my camera and telephoto lens :roll:

She does NOT like to be my model, mind ... silly kid .

 

[terri]

I like them all - but just love her very direct expression in the second one. :thumbup: Nice light in all of them, as well.

She is a lovely young woman. She is just going to have to accept being photographed!

 

[Alison]

Love the lighting and her expression in #2. I think these are by far the best portraits you have posted of her so far!

 

[mysteryscribe]

I like the pictures a lot.

Must admit my daughter started hating me when she started being the test subject for every new lighting setup i did. Some people just dont understant lol..

Odd man out but I like the last one the best.

 

[LaFoto]

Oh thank you!
I wish I could do some "training shots" with Sabine like jemmy is doing with her "training brides" just to try out some light situations and maybe even poses or backgrounds ... but all she will ever allow me to do (giving me glowering stares like in Photo 2 here) is to take spontaneous pics with the telephoto lens on situations such as this one. Hmph.

Her dad did not like me take photos too much, either:

Same stare...

Only my son was ok with it (just his "portraits" did not turn out that well and he is forever struggling with this skin these days) ...

... and also my father-in-law remained fairly undeterred by my camera:

 

[LaFoto]

I added a couple of pics, you might not have noticed ...!?!?

 

[LaFoto]

And more opinions, anyone, maybe?

 

[Big Mike]

The light in the first two, with your daughter, is great. Of only she would smile for us.

The first one of your F.I.L. is also very nice.

 

[markc]

The lighting on the set of your daughter is much improved! Very nice.

I think the second set still has some issues with the angle of the light. #3 works for me, but the others are a bit in shadow.

 

[LaFoto]

Thank you for your replies ... yes, if Sabine only once decided to smile for me ... but she prefers to glower at me ... oh well.

I was going through the entire series of pics taken on that occasion last Saturday to see if I could find that would show you the surroundings these were taken in, but the only overall views were taken with the Leica and the film hasn't been filled yet, so no pics as yet... and I am too lazy to go through ancient old files... if you saw that roofed verandah, you'd see the "light set-up", which was not set-up at all, I just made use of what light was there, falling into the roofed area from the one open side.

As you can see, later, when the light became lower and lower, and when I took the pics while I myself was sitting in the dark and my "victims" were against the light of the sky, I used the on-camera flash.

There are several more of when they all moved outside the roofed area to sit closer by the fire-in-the-drum ... I could look for some of my father-in-law among those. Again: no light SET-UPs, just the light from the evening sky (overcast).

 

[LaFoto]

But now LOOK what I found among the other pics of the series!?!?

 

[markc]

I don't usually set up light either. I prefer to use natural light. You don't have to be at the mercy of that's given to you, though. Sometimes simple moving a couple of feet will give you a much more pleasing "set-up". Even if the light is fixed, where your subject is and where you are will have a big impact. In that last one of your father-in-law, the light is very soft and difuse. Very nice. But his face is in shadow. I probably would have stood of to his right (camera left) and waited until he looked over at me. That way his face would have been better lit. Things like that.

It's tougher with unwilling subjects, but with patience, you can catch them in the right moment. If you see that they aren't in pleasing light and moving yourself won't help, wait until they move. In the case of the first shot, I probably would have waiting until he sat someplace else or see if the sun brightened up. It still might actually be a nice shot with some work in Photoshop with curves.