Portrait & Lighting C&C

Ballistics · Mar 3, 2012

Ok so I started practicing for my wife's make up portfolio tonight. I think I'm on the right track, but I have very little experience with lighting and portraiture. I've been here for a few months but I'm very green in this area.

I want the nitty gritty C&C for this.

Talia1 by The Photo Major, on Flickr

How is the lighting? Composition? Pose?

Ballistics · Mar 3, 2012

Bump for the AM

BuS_RiDeR · Mar 3, 2012

Not bad.

It could be my eyes... But it looks a hair underexposed to me...

Ballistics · Mar 4, 2012

I agree.

gsgary · Mar 4, 2012

You need to be more daring with your lighting (brighter) take a look at this guy's work Freelance professional photographer with studio, Digital photography, studio photography, portraits, product photography, lighting specialist, Bournemouth Poole Dorset

pgriz · Mar 4, 2012

You also need to keep an eye on the DOF. In that pic, the eyes are wonderfully sharp, but her nose is fuzzy.

gsgary · Mar 4, 2012

As above it looks like these were shot at about F2.8 should be more like F8-F11

SCraig · Mar 4, 2012

What are you trying to emphasize? Is it her face in general or is it a specific application of makeup? Everything should be geared toward the answer to that question.

As it stands right now her face is the main area of focus. Her hair, especially on the sides, is a bit underexposed. There is also a hot spot on her right cheek and on her lips. The focus is perfect on her eyes but her nose and ears are starting to get soft. Finally, the white cords on her shirt are distracting. The dark color of her shirt keeps attention on the face but those white bars keep drawing my eyes away.

It's a very good start and with a few tweaks I think you are very close to what you want to achieve.

Ballistics · Mar 4, 2012

I did use f/2.8 but I did also use guassian blur. I'm experimenting on touching up the skin. Not good at it, but I have to start somewhere.

Talia2 by The Photo Major, on Flickr

Here is the shot without the blur effect. You are right though, the nose is out of the DOF.

Good call on the hoodie strings.

Ballistics · Mar 4, 2012

SCraig said:
What are you trying to emphasize? Is it her face in general or is it a specific application of makeup? Everything should be geared toward the answer to that question.

Depending on the shot, it will either be the hair or makeup or both. Here I took the shot with just make up/face in mind.

As it stands right now her face is the main area of focus. Her hair, especially on the sides, is a bit underexposed. There is also a hot spot on her right cheek and on her lips. The focus is perfect on her eyes but her nose and ears are starting to get soft. Finally, the white cords on her shirt are distracting. The dark color of her shirt keeps attention on the face but those white bars keep drawing my eyes away.

I didn't even think about the hoodie or the wardrobe in general. Definitely going to have to do some research in that regard.

It's a very good start and with a few tweaks I think you are very close to what you want to achieve.

Ok great. Now to figure out what those tweaks are lol. Thanks for your input

Ballistics · Mar 4, 2012

gsgary said:
You need to be more daring with your lighting (brighter) take a look at this guy's work Freelance professional photographer with studio, Digital photography, studio photography, portraits, product photography, lighting specialist, Bournemouth Poole Dorset

Thank you for the link. Definitely good stuff here.

This is a pretty cool learning experience, although I do feel like I am trying to run before I walk. Luckily I haven't set any dates or anything like that so I can take my time and really learn my lighting set up.

Ballistics · Mar 4, 2012

How would I eliminate hot spots?

Stanza · Mar 4, 2012

The same! I think is beautiful but the ears over all are fussy. Ah! And maybe like a women who wants to see the make up I would try to see another angle.. To see more the make up in the eyes over all the shadows (the color she put in the eyes, I dont know in english!)

CowgirlMama · Mar 4, 2012

Stanza said:
The same! I think is beautiful but the ears over all are fussy. Ah! And maybe like a women who wants to see the make up I would try to see another angle.. To see more the make up in the eyes over all the shadows (the color she put in the eyes, I dont know in english!)

You're very right.

When she is looking up to the camera, all the makeup on her eyes is lost. If I'm looking to see her eye shadow, I won't get anything useful from this. I do think it's an overall nice shot of your wife, though.

Ballistics · Mar 4, 2012

The makeup she has on now is faint and neutral to begin with, this shot was to test the lighting and pose etc. Each make up style would have to have a different pose I'm assuming.