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Archive 2015 · First post, shy subject

Disaster
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · First post, shy subject

She is still a bit uncomfortable in front of the camera but has been a real trooper posing for me. Here is one from today. C&C welcome.

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-Klhl8O-_sjU/VPEuqmrLDLI/AAAAAAAADQc/v7TbpULHI3M/w1373-h1098-no/DSC_5512pscroprsclarity.jpg

Nikon D810, Sigma 50mm F1.4 Art, F2.2, ISO 250, S=1/125, natural window light, a bit of Photoshop.

Feb 27, 2015 at 10:05 PM

nolaguy
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · First post, shy subject

Hey Disaster,

I find it a pleasant portrait but here are the issues I see technically:

The depth of field is obviously super shallow. When shooting such nice, fast glass that's a temptation but unless the effect is intentional, it results in several distractions. Her right eye out of focus is one thing - most would say that if you're going to do that, you chose well in having the near eye in focus - but what makes it super distracting for me is (her) left eye and right brow in focus, right eye and left brow out of focus.

Hair strands in and out of focus - my eye is bouncing all around trying to find the intended subject.

Her skin tones are all over the place from reds to yellows to grays with the right side of the tip of her nose blown out or close to it. Personally I don't mind the latter but some would suggest backing off on that highlight. For me, I might tone down the reddish blush of her nose and lessen the dark circle under her left eye.

With such crisp focus, the mascara on the edge of her left eye lower lid - to me it's confusing. It would fit with a teary portrait but this shot feels more about soft beauty so it just seems messy and contradictory.

All in all, I think she's lovely... nice expression, composition and lighting - it just feels like a shot that isn't sure what it's supposed to be. The depth of field here is probably about a quarter inch, if that much. Had it been even an inch and a half - to me the shot would be greatly improved. Just my opinion.

Lastly, it will be easier for us to view if you size the long edge to 800 to 1000 pixels at most.

Hope this helps and btw, I liked your self portrait in the other thread.

Regards,

Chuck

Feb 27, 2015 at 11:27 PM

Disaster
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · First post, shy subject

nolaguy wrote:
Hey Disaster,

I find it a pleasant portrait but here are the issues I see technically:

The depth of field is obviously super shallow. When shooting such nice, fast glass that's a temptation but unless the effect is intentional, it results in several distractions. Her right eye out of focus is one thing - most would say that if you're going to do that, you chose well in having the near eye in focus - but what makes it super distracting for me is (her) left eye and right brow in focus, right eye and left brow out of focus.

Hair strands in...Show more →

Really appreciate the feedback, Chuck.

The shallow DOF was intentional, for the soft look, with just enough DOF (F2.2) to get the lashes and iris in focus. I agree that wasn't enough. There ends up being two totally different looking iris's because her right one is just a blurry ball. This would've worked much better if the OOF eye was in shadow, instead of actually in a brighter area of the photo...drawing one's attention to it.

It was the end of the day so her eyeliner or mascara had moved to her lid. I noticed that in post and should have cleaned it up.

I did intentionally lighten, again for a softer look, and then found the saturation was a little low so I pushed it...obviously too much. I think I had the vibrance and saturation sliders too high for the RAW conversion and then boosted it even more in post. That probably resulted in the color spread. I've noticed vibrance, in particular, can put some unnatural orangy colors into shadow areas.

Thanks again. It is nice to have fresh eyes on it, so I can do a better job next time.

P.S. All my computers now have high res monitors. I forget that isn't the case with a lot of folks. I'll post at lower res next time.

Edited on Feb 28, 2015 at 06:35 AM · View previous versions

Feb 28, 2015 at 04:40 AM

DaveOls
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · First post, shy subject

For a shy subject, I don't know how she let you get this close.
You probably could have accomplished this image better by taking it from 5 feet away which would have given you better DOF and then cropped to get this effect. Since you are using a D800 series camera, you can crop quite a bit.

Feb 28, 2015 at 06:34 AM

Disaster
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · First post, shy subject

DaveOls wrote:
For a shy subject, I don't know how she let you get this close.
You probably could have accomplished this image better by taking it from 5 feet away which would have given you better DOF and then cropped to get this effect. Since you are using a D800 series camera, you can crop quite a bit.

She isn't real comfortable with it. :-) I wanted the distortion, from the distance. I like how it distorts the size of the eyes (making them appear bigger), though it is a fine line, unconventional for a portrait, and not a choice some would make.

Thanks for the feedback. I'm going to shoot this one over with a tighter aperture and try some distance bracketing to see if I can find the right balance.

Feb 28, 2015 at 06:43 AM

nolaguy
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · First post, shy subject

Good morning and you're welcome, of course.

One thing I didn't notice last night was the clean up and whitening of (the whites) of her eyes. Did you desaturate or actually paint?

Feb 28, 2015 at 07:13 AM

Disaster
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · First post, shy subject

nolaguy wrote:
Good morning and you're welcome, of course.

One thing I didn't notice last night was the clean up and whitening of (the whites) of her eyes. Did you desaturate or actually paint?

I didn't touch the white of the left eye at all, actually. The blood vessels were soft to begin with (I masked and sharpened the iris a little.) Also, I did play with the overall curves and truncate the high side in an attempt to push it to the high key gentler side. This may have removed what was left of the any off color. On the right eye there was one stubborn bright red vessel grouping in the far corner. I used the clone tool at low opacity to drop some white from beside it until it was light enough. I may have borrowed too much from the bright area which caused it to be too uniform.

Feb 28, 2015 at 07:28 AM

nolaguy
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · First post, shy subject

Disaster wrote:
I didn't touch the white of the left eye at all, actually. The blood vessels were soft to begin with (I masked and sharpened the iris a little.) Also, I did play with the overall curves and truncate the high side in an attempt to push it to the high key gentler side. This may have removed what was left of the any off color. On the right eye there was one stubborn bright red vessel grouping in the far corner. I used the clone tool at low opacity to drop some white from beside it until it was light...Show more →

I assume you mean her left - and yes, that eye looks very natural and I like your treatment of her iris.

There are four things that caused me to wonder about her right eye (this is all referring to the whites, her far right):

The evenness of of the color and tone (though it seems to retain some shadow detail);

The absence of vessels or redness;

The tiny corner/end-of-white as her lower lid meets her iris - the slight rounded truncation of the white feels like a brush or clone tool;

And the lack of shadow detail along the edge of her lower lid as it meets the white of her eye. That could be the DOF blur but compare to her left eye and it seems to have lost that ever so slight shadow of the arc of the lower lid's edge.

For whitening of eyes and teeth, I generally mask, desaturate and sometimes slightly up the exposure, whites or hightlights. I can still muck it up but it retains the details, lessens distracting colors, brightens. For me it's the easiest way I've found for those touch ups.

Anyway, not trying to pick things apart - just studying and learning

Thanks for posting and enjoy your weekend.

Chuck

Feb 28, 2015 at 07:49 AM

Disaster
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · First post, shy subject

nolaguy wrote:
I assume you mean her left - and yes, that eye looks very natural and I like your treatment of her iris.

There are four things that caused me to wonder about her right eye (this is all referring to the whites, her far right):

The evenness of of the color and tone (though it seems to retain some shadow detail);

The absence of vessels or redness;

The tiny corner/end-of-white as her lower lid meets her iris - the slight rounded truncation of the white feels like a brush or clone tool;

And the lack of shadow detail along the edge of her lower lid...Show more →

Yes. Her left eye had no white work done.

Other than cloning some white over top the one blood vessel on her right eye, I did no other work. I tried to keep the size of the clone stamp small enough so as not to mess with the overall shading, but not so small that feathering would be an issue.

I suspect you are seeing the effects of the very shallow DOF and maybe a bit of the wash of the clone stamp.

I agree with you on editing for the whites of the eyes and teeth. I find that if I mess with them too much I end up making them look muddy and unnatural. Instead I mainly use desaturation (especially for the teeth) and use lightening very judiciously. Sometimes people will have stains between their teeth and I will clone that lighter, but it is difficult work to get rid of the stain and still keep a realistic shadow (at least it is for my skill level.)

I really do appreciate the feedback. I'm planning on cajoling her into a few more shots this morning, keeping the advice in mind.

Feb 28, 2015 at 08:09 AM

Disaster
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · First post, shy subject

By the way, here is an earlier, similar photo, where I attempted an even more high key effect. In this one, taken with the Sigma 85mm, I had enough DOF for both eyes and the subject distance was greater. I really like how the eyes came out in this shot but there are various other problems here and there that bother me. For example when I was lightening the shadow around her left eye I accidentally let the feathering wander into the hair area, lightening that as well. I tried to mask and recover afterwards but it didn't really get it back to where it was originally. Also, the saturation and red channel might be a bit too much and it has the orange shadow stuff going on that I talked about earlier. I made a mess of the hair cleanup too. I need to work on my skills in that arena.

Having said all that, I've got an 8x10 of this printed and hanging in my office and it gets lots of positive comments.

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-mIKTut8fVtg/VPHQQT7JzwI/AAAAAAAADS4/5q50_fgJ584/s2048/DSC_3819ps5hikey3.jpg

Nikon D810, Sigma 85mm, F3.2, 1/60, ISO 64, natural window light.

Feb 28, 2015 at 09:34 AM

Disaster
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · First post, shy subject

Not sure if that link worked. I can see it but Google + albums are sometimes funny. Here is the link Google gave me.

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-mIKTut8fVtg/VPHQQT7JzwI/AAAAAAAADS4/5q50_fgJ584/s800/DSC_3819ps5hikey3.jpg

Feb 28, 2015 at 09:45 AM

nolaguy
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · First post, shy subject

I like that shot very much. And it would be stunning in black and white.

I'd consider cloning out the pendant - there's not enough left of it to be meaningful so to me it's just a distraction. Nevertheless, this shot's a lovely win imo. Nice job.

Chuck

Feb 28, 2015 at 10:04 AM

Disaster
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · First post, shy subject

Thank you for the feedback. Funny you should mention B&W because did a conversion earlier. I think I might have pushed it to far because the outline of the nose was lost, but again I love the eyes. Now that you mentioned it I do notice the pendant is even less recognizable in this B&W shot and there is even more of a case for removing it.

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-hozfp5vL6g4/VPHarCMzaOI/AAAAAAAADTc/80QnwZIedTI/s800/DSC_3819pshk.jpg

Feb 28, 2015 at 10:13 AM

nolaguy
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · First post, shy subject

Gosh yes. She's beautiful and her eyes slay me.

Yes, your conversion is pretty intense - not a miss, just a very particular interpretation. I downloaded your file and was playing with the bw as you posted and even with the jpeg (hopefully you have the raw file) there's enough range to do something more subtle if you chose to.

Clearly I'm feeling chatty this morning so I'll continue my ramble with a couple of other thoughts...

In my bw tinkering the left edge of the crop was a bit nondescript with the high key and I wondered how the image would look if the crop was less tight and maybe even a 1:1 ratio, her positioned to the right of the frame (viewer perspective) and the full outline of her hair (viewer's left) visible inside the crop - or conversely, crop even tighter so her hair more definitively framed the crop.

You're working with A LOT of pixels with the 810 and as Dave mentioned, shooting from a bit of distance to leave plenty of room to experiment with crops is a nice luxury.

On that note, this is such a nice portrait I'd love to see it two or three times the 8x10 size. Professional prints are so affordable these days I'm never shy about going BIG, having the lab mount it and not worrying about the expense of matting or framing. This image should be a mural.

Feb 28, 2015 at 10:29 AM

Disaster
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · First post, shy subject

nolaguy wrote:
Gosh yes. She's beautiful and her eyes slay me.

Yes, your conversion is pretty intense - not a miss, just a very particular interpretation. I downloaded your file and was playing with the bw as you posted and even with the jpeg (hopefully you have the raw file) there's enough range to do something more subtle if you chose to.

Clearly I'm feeling chatty this morning so I'll continue my ramble with a couple of other thoughts...

In my bw tinkering the left edge of the crop was a bit nondescript with the high key and I wondered how the image would look...Show more →

Thanks again.

I won't take offense if you want to post your B&W conversion.

This PP is a far cry from the original photo which was never intended for high key. There was a lot of masking and playing with the curves including using the assistance of some Topaz plug-ins for the B&W conversion and HDR to amplify the eye color. I've got the RAW file awaiting another go. I'll have to go back to see how much room I left myself for different crops.

Feb 28, 2015 at 10:57 AM

Disaster
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p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · First post, shy subject

As long as I'm taking my licks, here is a one light, one reflector studio shot. It is work to get someone who isn't comfortable behind the camera at ease. This one was one of my favorite from the session because she loosened up. I had her toss her hair around and get silly. The unfortunate consequence was the hair blocked the catch light in her right eye and tangled in her necklace. But the expression is real.

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-B-25O9qBF6E/VPHmYvsGShI/AAAAAAAADTs/3bolO6xQI9c/s800/DSC_4428ps2rs.jpg

Nikon D810, Tamron 70-200 F2.8, F9, ISO 64, 1/125, Single 47" softbox high left, reflector on right.

Feb 28, 2015 at 11:05 AM

nolaguy
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p.1 #17 · p.1 #17 · First post, shy subject

Thanks buddy. I've enjoyed the conversation and look forward to seeing what you do with your files and lovely model next. Please give her my compliments.

Chuck

Feb 28, 2015 at 11:25 AM

nolaguy
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p.1 #18 · p.1 #18 · First post, shy subject

Hey Disaster,

Thanks for the invitation to play with the conversion. Working from the 300K jpeg there wasn't a lot of dynamic range available so the gradations are coarse and the end results are too paintery but I enjoyed messing around with it. Thanks again. I know you're going to have such fun as you continue to work with her.

Chuck

Feb 28, 2015 at 02:26 PM

Disaster
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p.1 #19 · p.1 #19 · First post, shy subject

nolaguy wrote:
Hey Disaster,

Thanks for the invitation to play with the conversion. Working from the 300K jpeg there wasn't a lot of dynamic range available so the gradations are coarse and the end results are too paintery but I enjoyed messing around with it. Thanks again. I know you're going to have such fun as you continue to work with her.

Chuck

I like your first one the most, but it might just be because you don't have enough range to work with. The last one is more like a black and white conversion sans high key that is at the disadvantage of not having the original RAW file to work with.

I was able to sneak in a bunch more shots today. Going through them now.

Thanks again.

Feb 28, 2015 at 05:12 PM

coreybell
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p.1 #20 · p.1 #20 · First post, shy subject

You are learning a lot from nolaguy

is it my monitor, or are 2,3,4, 6,7,8 very over exposed? I like your lighting of #2, Her hair over her eye is distracting to me.

Feb 28, 2015 at 05:24 PM

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