Working the Dark

[GDHLEWIS]

Few more Welders earning their $'s, there not the final edits as I'm stuck using my rubbish work comp for the time being. Any comments or feedback as always is most welcome. Hope you enjoy.
SET UP: D3200, 35mm 1.8, 1.2 Tiffen ND filter
SETTINGS: 1/40, iso 800 f8 setting are varied for each if I remember correctly but its roughly in those areas.

Am relatively happy with how they came out.

 

[GDHLEWIS]

Didn't think they were that bad

 

[caseyrbrown]

Overall, interesting shots but here are a few things that stick out to me;

They all seem underexposed. I'm not sure why you're shooting at f/8, where you could be shooting much wider, like f/2.8 or f/4. This would provide less DOF, which would highlight your subject a little better. I think you were going for a slow shutter speed to catch the motion of the sparks, but I think these shots would have benefited from a wider aperture and a little more exposure. Also, you're shooting at ISO 800, which is pushing it on a D3200. You could have gotten the slow shutter speed effect from using ISO 200 or lower, shooting almost wide open, and you wouldn't have lost so much detail in the shadows. Also, it seems like you missed focus on them, since he is a little blurry, and speaking from experience, the 35 1.8 is pretty darn sharp.

I think another thing that would improve these is tighter crops on all of them. The welder is clearly the subject, so you should focus on him.

 

[GDHLEWIS]

Thanks Casey for the comments, Iv still not had time to put these through Elements to clear and crop things. The aim was to only get a glimpse of the welder so I wanted the majority of the image to be near completely black, so I'm gonna have to edit a little more than I planned to. Your right about them not being as sharp as they should trying to get focus without blinding myself and through the filter caused a few issues but live and learn I suppose.

Thanks for the comment