WEll done, Hatch!
All the posing and expressions are great, and the aperture selection gave you just the right background in 1 & 2 plus the last one. Great job.
These will be appreciated by the family.
The color of the blue jeans contrasts and clashes with the warm backgrounds, becoming a distraction. In the future you might point that out in advance and suggest earth-toned pants in darker shades of brown or green which would be less distracting.
Keeping the heads closer together will project a stronger body language of closeness: Your last shot of the two kids posted with the heads touching creates the kind of intimate body language that comes across well in a photo. In your first shot the composition is more like separate father/daughter and mother/son pairing than tight family group. In the second if there was less vertical separation between mom and the kid's faces it would have a more intimate vibe. The third would have a closer feel if mom and dad's heads were together.
When you have a great background, ideal clothes, a nice pose and great lighting the final step in making a photo more effective is spotting and eliminating / minimizing potential distractions from the faces. Touch conveys closeness in person, but when photos get too "handsy" all the extra skintones in the shot can begin to distract from the faces. The faces will be seen first of course, but then the curious viewer will be attracted by the contrast of the hands to go check them out, which pulls attention off the face. Look at the hands in each of your photos. Ask yourself, "Would they be missed if not in the photo?" If not they are potential distractions from the faces.
When there are hands in the shot using a masked multiply layer in post-processing to make the hands darker than the faces will make them less noticeable and less distracting. Applying a bit of blur will do the same thing, sending an subliminal message to the viewer that the sharper faces are more important. Not so much that its noticed, but just enough to take the "edge" of sharpness/brightness contrast off the hands so by contrast the faces are more compelling visually. A good test for tonal distractions is to take the photo and blur it with 10-15px gaussian blur. You'll be better able to visualize how the tone of the bright hands competes for attention with the faces on a perceptual "where to look next in the photo" level. The more distractions from the faces you eliminate, the longer the "hang time" on the faces will be.
I'm just posting here so that I can come back and view these photo's over and over and over and over again.
Beautiful exposure, colors and attention to detail.
richdavid wrote:
I'm just posting here so that I can come back and view these photo's over and over and over and over again.
Beautiful exposure, colors and attention to detail.
Thanks for posting and sharing your set-up.
Rich
Thank you very much Rich for the great comments. Very happy to know you enjoyed the images.
Jim Rickards wrote:
WEll done, Hatch!
All the posing and expressions are great, and the aperture selection gave you just the right background in 1 & 2 plus the last one. Great job.
These will be appreciated by the family.
Thank you Jim! We will see the family tomorrow for a sales session... fingers crossed.. they will by something other than an 8x10
The color of the blue jeans contrasts and clashes with the warm backgrounds, becoming a distraction. In the future you might point that out in advance and suggest earth-toned pants in darker shades of brown or green which would be less distracting.
Keeping the heads closer together will project a stronger body language of closeness: Your last shot of the two kids posted with the heads touching creates the kind of intimate body language that comes across well in a photo. In your first shot the composition is more like separate father/daughter and mother/son pairing than tight family group. In the second if there was less vertical separation between mom and the kid's faces it would have a more intimate vibe. The third would have a closer feel if mom and dad's heads were together.
When you have a great background, ideal clothes, a nice pose and great lighting the final step in making a photo more effective is spotting and eliminating / minimizing potential distractions from the faces. Touch conveys closeness in person, but when photos get too "handsy" all the extra skintones in the shot can begin to distract from the faces. The faces will be seen first of course, but then the curious viewer will be attracted by the contrast of the hands to go check them out, which pulls attention off the face. Look at the hands in each of your photos. Ask yourself, "Would they be missed if not in the photo?" If not they are potential distractions from the faces.
When there are hands in the shot using a masked multiply layer in post-processing to make the hands darker than the faces will make them less noticeable and less distracting. Applying a bit of blur will do the same thing, sending an subliminal message to the viewer that the sharper faces are more important. Not so much that its noticed, but just enough to take the "edge" of sharpness/brightness contrast off the hands so by contrast the faces are more compelling visually. A good test for tonal distractions is to take the photo and blur it with 10-15px gaussian blur. You'll be better able to visualize how the tone of the bright hands competes for attention with the faces on a perceptual "where to look next in the photo" level. The more distractions from the faces you eliminate, the longer the "hang time" on the faces will be.
Thanks for tips Chuck. We were very lucky to get the girls to look at us.. .and then smirk or smile... they just wanted to run around and play.
We asked for the jeans since we knew we would sit them in the dirt. I boosted the color a little on them... I don't think they are fighting for attention in the scene. If they all wore brown or tan... it might draw more attention to the faces... would have to give it try. Thanks again for the post.
Volktronic wrote:
Very nice, my only crit is the black shirts. I would have told the family "not all in black". They kind of have that floating head syndrome.
~Zach
Hi Zach,
Thanks for the comments. Might be a monitor thing? Just finished printing some these and this are details in the blacks.. and serparation... hmmm
I appreciate the comments.