Portrait of my Girlfriend

[birdbonkers84]

No.1

No.2

No.3

These shots were taken using a tripod and a Nikon 50mm prime lens. Only light source was a big window to the right of the camera at around 11 am.

On No.1 you'll notice random strands of hair, especially near the bottom of her chin. Are there any specific techniques I could use in post to remove these?

 

[mmaria]

missed focus in all of them

spot healing brush tool for hair... among else... you tube is your friend for techniques

she's a cutie

 

[birdbonkers84]

missed focus in all of them

spot healing brush tool for hair... among else... you tube is your friend for techniques

she's a cutie

Thanks for your reply,

I made an attempt to have my focus point on her eyes, is my shutter speed to slow then? I was using a wireless remote.

 

[mmaria]

I made an attempt to have my focus point on her eyes, is my shutter speed to slow then?

well your settings were probably wrong because you don't understand them ... you need to understand dof and posing, recomposing... just practice and see what happens

I was using a wireless remote.

why?

 

[loonatic45414]

A lot of portraits are traditionally done in soft focus. It's a great collection, lovely shots but a touch too bright since there are some colors washing out.

I would stop the aperture down to the point where the shutter speed gets around 1/50 or 1/60. That should get everything more or less into focus. At that point you can do any soft focusing in post processing.

In the old days we'd have a lens with a light coat of oil or even use nose grease on the negative for soft focus, but no need to go there these days.

Sent from my 0PJA2 using Tapatalk

 

[Peeb]

well your settings were probably wrong because you don't understand them ... you need to understand dof and posing, recomposing... just practice and see what happens

OP said he was going for the eyes as a focal point and your immediate assumption is that any miss is the result ignorance?

Maybe.

Or maybe his camera/lens combination needs to be fine tuned. Appears to me his rig might be back-focusing a tad.

Maybe he's right that his shutter speed was too slow (couldn't find any EXIF).

Lovely subject, btw

 

[birdbonkers84]

A lot of portraits are traditionally done in soft focus. It's a great collection, lovely shots but a touch too bright since there are some colors washing out.

I would stop the aperture down to the point where the shutter speed gets around 1/50 or 1/60. That should get everything more or less into focus. At that point you can do any soft focusing in post processing.

In the old days we'd have a lens with a light coat of oil or even use nose grease on the negative for soft focus, but no need to go there these days.

Sent from my 0PJA2 using Tapatalk

Hey thanks for your comments,

I think it must be a monitor problem i.e not calibrated properly. The images on my home monitor appear darker. Luckily I can see what you mean, I have 2 monitors at work and one shows these images really bright (hence I understand what you mean) and the other shows them how my monitor at home shows it. So that's one issue I need to sort asap, buy a new calibrated monitor.

I've looked back at the photo details and yes my shutter speed was too slow and not the minimum 1/50 for the length of my lens. I was also shooting in A mode instead of manual (oops).

I'm here to learn...and that's why I'm not scared of CC when I've made a mistake

 

[pixmedic]

i dont think there was any missed focus on #1. i dont know what the aperture was for these shots, or how far away from the subject you were, but it could be a DOF issue.
in #2 i think it might be a camera movement issue...too show a shutter speed. could be what happened in #3 as well.
for these, i would have shot with a faster SS and more DOF. maybe f/5.6 or so.
i think the white balance is off with all of these... that could just be the color of your walls, but her skin looked red tinty in LR.
i took a stab at these. i didnt want to mess with cloning or healing or anything like that...just a few minor tweaks to suit how I would edit them.

this shot is fine for a shoulder/head shot. (fly away hairs aside) theres really nothing terribly wrong with this one.
i think this was probably shot between f/1.8 and f/2.8 and you just needed more DOF since im guessing you were standing pretty close.

focus issues here. it looks like her knees are in focus. i love the concept, but i would reshoot this one. i straightened this one out a bit as well as WB.

a little straightening done here too. i really like this shot. its a great horizontal portrait.
honestly, there arent any glaring focus issues here. this shot is fine as well for web viewing or even prints 11x14 or less.

overall, you have the right idea. get monitor calibrating tools. I use colormunki display. not terribly expensive.
there could be backfocusing issues...and if your shooting at f/1.8 or something like that, it makes focusing more difficult.
also, even if your using a good tripod, remember that people dont always hold perfectly still so make sure your shutter speed is high enough to compensate for small movements in your subjects.
i like a decent DOF in my portraits. I dont like portraits where the face is in focus, but you lose focus by the time you get around to the ears....so im always shooting at f/4 or higher, and rarely under a shutter speed of 1/160th.

in my opinion, #1 and #3 are fine for web viewing and small prints.

 

[birdbonkers84]

i dont think there was any missed focus on #1. i dont know what the aperture was for these shots, or how far away from the subject you were, but it could be a DOF issue.
in #2 i think it might be a camera movement issue...too show a shutter speed. could be what happened in #3 as well.
for these, i would have shot with a faster SS and more DOF. maybe f/5.6 or so.
i think the white balance is off with all of these... that could just be the color of your walls, but her skin looked red tinty in LR.
i took a stab at these. i didnt want to mess with cloning or healing or anything like that...just a few minor tweaks to suit how I would edit them.

this shot is fine for a shoulder/head shot. (fly away hairs aside) theres really nothing terribly wrong with this one.
i think this was probably shot between f/1.8 and f/2.8 and you just needed more DOF since im guessing you were standing pretty close.
View attachment 135458


focus issues here. it looks like her knees are in focus. i love the concept, but i would reshoot this one. i straightened this one out a bit as well as WB.
View attachment 135460


a little straightening done here too. i really like this shot. its a great horizontal portrait.
honestly, there arent any glaring focus issues here. this shot is fine as well for web viewing or even prints 11x14 or less.
View attachment 135461

overall, you have the right idea. get monitor calibrating tools. I use colormunki display. not terribly expensive.
there could be backfocusing issues...and if your shooting at f/1.8 or something like that, it makes focusing more difficult.
also, even if your using a good tripod, remember that people dont always hold perfectly still so make sure your shutter speed is high enough to compensate for small movements in your subjects.
i like a decent DOF in my portraits. I dont like portraits where the face is in focus, but you lose focus by the time you get around to the ears....so im always shooting at f/4 or higher, and rarely under a shutter speed of 1/160th.

in my opinion, #1 and #3 are fine for web viewing and small prints.

Thank you for the feedback Pixmedic,

I guess I need to get used to also posting the exposure settings so the forum yodas can work their magic. I've linked these via tinypics and I'm guessing it doesn't post the EXIF data.

No.1 - F/8.0 shutter speed 1/10 (too slow I get that now) ISO 100, tripod with wireless remote, 1 source of light in the form of a big ass window for all 3.

No.2 - F/8.0 Shutter speed 1/13, ISO 100.

No.3 - F/8.0 Shutter speed 1/13 ISO 100.

These were all shot on Aperture Priority mode, which I understand now probably wasn't the correct function to use as it controls the SS for me. I'll remember to use manual mode next time and bump up the ISO or use a lower F stop.

These images have only been edited in Photoshop RAW, it's just a plain white wall that she was sitting in front of and the camera was around 1-2 meters from her (give or take).

 

[Ysarex]

About the focus: As pixmedic noted the focus is forward in the seated photos -- her feet and knees. This is classic auto-focus behavior. The auto-focus system in a DSLR is designed to lock focus on the closest thing it finds. If you have more than one focus sensor active then the equation is simple ==> the sensor over the closest object in the scene will lock first and that's your focus point. Go over the camera's AF system controls and make sure your focus point will be her eyes next time.

Don't save your photos as PNG files. Use JPEG. The PNG format is not able to store an ICC color space profile and so it breaks color management leaving the colors in your photo undefined. PNG is an inappropriate format for photography.

I went ahead and did the hair re-touch you asked about in the first photo -- cloning tools. I went further and did a little more re-touch and made some color and tone adjustments -- your skin tone for her was leaning somewhat Mediterranean (olive yellow) and your location says you're from Scotland.

Joe

 

[goooner]

You need to use a flash. Bounce it off the ceiling and up your ss to 125-200. I got a cheapish 60€ flash off ebay that works great on my nikon, it makes the world of difference.

 

[birdbonkers84]

About the focus: As pixmedic noted the focus is forward in the seated photos -- her feet and knees. This is classic auto-focus behavior. The auto-focus system in a DSLR is designed to lock focus on the closest thing it finds. If you have more than one focus sensor active then the equation is simple ==> the sensor over the closest object in the scene will lock first and that's your focus point. Go over the camera's AF system controls and make sure your focus point will be her eyes next time.

Don't save your photos as PNG files. Use JPEG. The PNG format is not able to store an ICC color space profile and so it breaks color management leaving the colors in your photo undefined. PNG is an inappropriate format for photography.

I went ahead and did the hair re-touch you asked about in the first photo -- cloning tools. I went further and did a little more re-touch and made some color and tone adjustments -- your skin tone for her was leaning somewhat Mediterranean (olive yellow) and your location says you're from Scotland.

Joe

View attachment 135464

Thanks Joe,

I'll make sure to start saving in .jpg for photos from now on!

I always have single point focus on, I definitely had it over the subjects eyes for the first photo, maybe I didn't for the other two!? Either way I'll make doubly sure next time! Your edit is great and I like it the vignette is a really nice touch. I'll need to research more into retouching as I did the bare minimum on these in PS RAW.

Dunno about the skin tone, didn't think I upped the saturation at all and certainly didn't touch the tint or temp sliders. I'll go back and have a look over the file and see if I can match it to your edit

Also my g.f will probably kill me for saying this, but she use a body wash that gives a slight colouring to her skin, coming from Scotland we don't see a lot of sunshine

 

[pixmedic]

You need to use a flash. Bounce it off the ceiling and up your ss to 125-200. I got a cheapish 60€ flash off ebay that works great on my nikon, it makes the world of difference.

^^^ this! ^^^

a bounced flash works wonders for indoor shooting.

 

[birdbonkers84]

You need to use a flash. Bounce it off the ceiling and up your ss to 125-200. I got a cheapish 60€ flash off ebay that works great on my nikon, it makes the world of difference.

Thanks Goooner,

I have that on my amazon wish list, I was initially going for natural light, but I'll definitely give that a try!

 

[Ysarex]

Dunno about the skin tone, didn't think I upped the saturation at all and certainly didn't touch the tint or temp sliders.

How did you set the white balance in the first place?

Joe