Beauty/Fashion Portrait

comments welcome.

I am not a portrait photographer so all I can do is comment on "my preferences". This style of photography is what I use to refer to as "blown out". It lacks detail and the subject blends into the background. As I believe this has become a common style I can say you executed it nicely. Attractive model. Jim

Correct, it's what is referred to as (High Key).
Where skin becomes porcelain like...smooth
But detail is still on edges.

For me, its a bit too high key as you've also lost much detail in the dress. Also, I'm curious @ the purple/magenta areas ... sat @ 100% for illustration.

WHoo. WAy to much magenta...

Yep, I think Kent was just showing you how he knows by putting sat at 100%. Its a good way to see color cast issues and one I have started using.

Prego ... "it's in there"

Yes, the 100% sat was just to show that it is in there. While, she could be wearing that color eye shadow, and the furniture might have some in the brown ... it's the shadowing on her dress that is making me ask.

Given how little things change for most of the image @ 100% sat ... I"m intrigued by the magenta areas that changed the most ... and why

I think the high key look works well for the subject.

There are two things that are bothering me a bit:
- The face is a bit washed out and low in contrast. So the chest which has much greater contrast immediately pulls my eye toward it and away from the face. I'm guessing this is not what you're going for. Similarly, the visible pieces of the chair are a bit distracting because they are so much darker than everything else.
- The way she is holding her arms makes it seem as if she is closing herself off. It's also squishing her chest into a somewhat less than flattering position.

if you study the image, you can see that she was laying down on a sofa... I rotated the image... I attached a 2nd image to show the crop/rotate...in the first.

as far as color, I adjusted to taste, not specs.

INFOCUSPHOTO wrote:
Beauty/Fashion Portrait

comments welcome.

INFOCUSPHOTO wrote:
as far as color, I adjusted to taste.

+1 @ creative license/liberty ... i.e. S&P to taste.


It just happened that when I was trying to recover some detail in the dress, I noticed the magenta tones in the shadows. Not a critique per se ... just a curiousity @ where they came from. I understood the color in the wood / eye shadow ... but not the shadowing on the dress. No worries, just trying to understand. Gotcha @ magenta coming from ... to taste (albeit too subtle to detect in OP).

Now that I've got that outa the way ...

+1 @ Mr. Bean ... but I'm okay with the "closed off" posing, as long as the intent is to project that kind of a mood. For me, the posing and facial expression are both a bit "aloof" ... so they are congruous and I'm assuming that was the intent. But, imo, her face is still a bit too dull/gray/desat ... that kinda gives her a bit of a "dead" look to her, moreover than customary high key. Again, intent is key @ creative.

I do like the rotation on the image. I was a bit confused by the furniture as I couldn't figure it out (thinking it surely wasn't a chair ), but I think it offers an intrigue, that goes along well (congruous) with the intrigue of aloof @ posing / facial expression. Just wish her facial color had a bit more life to it.

Intrigue suggests I want to know more ... dead looking suggests time to move on. I'd like to see these two become more congruous, by giving a bit more life to her color / tone.