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Archive 2013 · Amanda's Profile

  
 
Evan Baines
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Amanda's Profile


A slight change of pace from my military series. This Thanksgiving, I'm thankful for my beautiful wife.

Your thoughts and comments are always welcome.

http://www.evanbaines.com/fredmiranda/turkey.jpg

Added image:
2.
http://www.evanbaines.com/fredmiranda/turkey-2.jpg

Shot using just the modeling light and the 85L wide open.

Setup:
http://www.evanbaines.com/fredmiranda/turkey-1.jpg



Edited on Nov 28, 2013 at 09:02 PM · View previous versions



Nov 28, 2013 at 05:30 PM
bwalwork
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Amanda's Profile


Nice portrait and especially useful to see your lighting setup.

Lovely lady! Lucky Photog!



Nov 28, 2013 at 06:55 PM
ronan_M
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Amanda's Profile


Great shot, but, honestly, I think her expression on the "lightning setup" shot is much better! She looks 5 years younger there.
cheers




Nov 28, 2013 at 07:24 PM
bryanlindsey
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Amanda's Profile


I have to think long and hard before critiquing someone like you, Evan. So I will ask just two questions.

Do you feel that you have captured the most honest and precise portrayal of your wife? I have never met your wife...is the impression that I get from this photo accurate?



Nov 28, 2013 at 07:40 PM
Evan Baines
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Amanda's Profile


Bryan,

I think today I was tired of trying to "accurately reflect the subject," which is a bit exhausting... Mostly I just wanted to make something that looked interesting. The second shot I just added is closer.

I think in retrospect this shot (and probably the whole session) is definitely a failure... Although maybe its good that I posted it as people can analyze why it doesn't work. Fortunately, she'll be around and I'll have many more chances. I was trying to do something specific, and I lost sight of the forest for the trees.



Nov 28, 2013 at 07:49 PM
nolaguy
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Amanda's Profile


After waxing on about you in Tony’s thread it’s pretty cool to get to throw a few rocks now.

Just kidding.

I’m not sure why you would consider this portrait a failure unless you don’t feel it captures her essence and that was your intent. What I see is a beautiful woman (with amazing hair) in a candid, almost unaware “strength moment”. To me it’s got a kinda Joan of Arc sort of vibe… but not contrived. It seems simple, sincere, real. Like ronan, I do love the setup shot, her expression – and feel I know more of her through the addition of the image.

Technically, it’s gorgeous. The exposure, colors, play of (and fall off of) light are sublime. My three crits would be:

1) I sometimes disagree with your crops. I keep telling myself I need to learn from your handling but my inclination would be to cut the distance between the right most edge of her hair and the border by half.

2) The light barely cresting across her cheek brings out skin texture to an exaggerated degree. I’m perfectly comfortable smoothing that a bit in post because I don’t think that exaggeration (and I often get this because I like and use this sort of lighting) is a true representation of what the person generally looks like.

3) I would love to see this shot as one in a series with other expressions (such as the set up shot). My guess is this is one of her many sides and it makes me want to see the rest.

Blessed Thanksgiving to you and yours,

Chuck


Edit: Just saw the image you added. I really like it. Same crop critique but I love seeing more of her. You're a fortunate man.



Nov 28, 2013 at 09:16 PM
Jim Rickards
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Amanda's Profile


A few nits from me, Evan.

One thing I noticed in #1 was that the profile was "off" a bit. By that I mean we see part of her far eye and brow. Whether a full profile would be more or less pleasing is a matter to discuss.

As for composition, I wonder whether placing her (in #1 & #2) farther to our right would help.




Nov 29, 2013 at 01:48 AM
david1234
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Amanda's Profile


Light is great! Did you use a ND on your 85?


Nov 29, 2013 at 03:28 AM
deinfaces
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · Amanda's Profile


In what way do you consider this a failure? What did you want that you did not get?


Nov 29, 2013 at 07:26 AM
jfinite
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · Amanda's Profile


^What Jim said.


Nov 29, 2013 at 01:35 PM
cadman342001
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · Amanda's Profile


I don't think full profile even if done without the far eye/eyebrow in the shot is the most flattering for your wife's face shape.

I think the lighting is fine, etc etc, it's just she doesn't look comfortable to me. She looks how my wife looks when I make her pose for me - I think we lose sight of the fact that when it's one of our own, we assume they are comfortable because they are family and perhaps we forget to do the whole "spiel" making the subject comfortable ?

Just my $0.02

Andy



Nov 29, 2013 at 07:25 PM
Evan Baines
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · Amanda's Profile


I wince a little every time I get a response notification to this thread.

Part of the problem is that I'm obsessed with this darn Seidner book I have, where he asked all the models to sort of absent themselves and fall into their roles. This is a nod to old-school portrait painters, who couldn't have subjects hold an expression. I'm not sure if the absence thing fails because of the lack of lots of other details (clothes, setting, etc), or if I'm just not leading my subject to the correct kind of absence. Andy, I think you're probably right that I was taking her comfort for granted a bit.

The shots were at least 50% about the hair, which may explain some of the cropping decisions that people mentioned. Taking the shots in from the right makes the hair visually less important, although it achieves more conventional portrait composition. I tend to shoot more B&W than color, but this time I wanted to emphasize my wife's lovely hair.

I dunno. I'm less concerned with the (profound) mediocrity than the fact that I didn't immediately recognize it. That is worrisome.

Oh well. Its not like I do this for a living.

Thanks for the feedback everyone!



Nov 29, 2013 at 07:36 PM
deinfaces
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · Amanda's Profile


Maybe you should (do it for a living).


Nov 29, 2013 at 08:07 PM
nolaguy
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · Amanda's Profile


Evan Baines wrote:
Taking the shots in from the right makes the hair visually less important...


In my humble opinion, the only thing you could possibly do to make that remarkable head of hair visually less important would be if the portrait was of someone else.

Amanda is stunning.



Nov 29, 2013 at 08:11 PM
Evan Baines
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · Amanda's Profile


deinfaces wrote:
Maybe you should (do it for a living).


Terrible idea. I did the professional photographer thing for a while, but I'm much happier in my current career. I rather like being an amateur photographer as well.

Chuck: Yep, she's a stunner. Dunno how I got so lucky to find such a brilliant, talented, and lovely women with such bad taste in men.



Nov 29, 2013 at 08:22 PM
sticknpuck
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p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · Amanda's Profile


Hey Evan, just wanted to tell you how much I like your images and reading your thoughts (and others) about them. I'm an amateur and also enjoy working on the classic portraiture style that you are obviously very good at. Do you have any good books you could recommend or other sources of good inspiration both technical or otherwise?

Look forward to reading more of your posts.

All the best.

Matt



Nov 30, 2013 at 12:02 AM
Evan Baines
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p.1 #17 · p.1 #17 · Amanda's Profile


Thank you Matt, that is very kind of you.

The siren call upon whose rocks I keep crashing is this volume of portraits by Seidner: http://www.amazon.com/Portraits-David-Seidner/dp/2843231523/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385825185&sr=8-1&keywords=david+seidner

His approach to the subject is in many ways antithetical to mine, but I find it captivating regardless. Seidner attempted to recreate the portraiture of John Singer Sargent and others in photographic portraiture, with fantastic results. One of the things in this series is that he had most of the subjects effectively vacate themselves into the role: these are very much not character portraits. It seems that whenever I try to incorporate aspects of that approach into my own work, I get unfortunate results such as those on display in this thread.... but even outside of that, if you are interested in seeing photography that is truly "classic" rather than "traditional" (a difference I define by adherence to principals rather than adherence to a particular set of rules derived from those principals)... this is the book.

If you are interested in learning the "heroic" portrait, Karsh is the obvious choice. Karsh photographed most of the leading lights of the 20th century, and no one was better at using classic techniques to enshrine leaders and celebrities in all their glory.



Nov 30, 2013 at 10:34 AM





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