Reply To: In need of comments & critiques.

[Bill]

Okay, here it goes! Ebi, you played bad cop, now it’s my turn to play good cop, LOL.

I hope you know by having a name like Images by…..only draws harsher criticism to you like a lightning rod. It implies a mastery of imagery, which you clearly state you do not possess.

I’m hoping that you took ebi’s comments to heart as he was being genuine. To some it may sound harsh and hard to take, but when you look at 99% of what he has to say, he is usually pretty much dead on.

I am going to go through one by one and give you a honest review and give you my take on it.
Image #1 – Not sure where to really start, I’ll go with the good first, it’s sharp and in focus. I don’t care for the pose and his expression on his face, looks too aggressive as if he were holding her as a possession. 2nd, the DOF could be better and the subjects further away from that green stained fence which looks like mold, not pleasant to see in a portrait.

Image #2 – This one I though was kind of cute. Maybe a bit too much bokeh fot the background but that can be hit and miss. 2. The little white spots, not sure if they are bugs in the air or spots on your lens or both, you should clone those out. 3. The little girl’s skin color looks a little on the green side, maybe try warming it up a slight bit and fix the tint. I did a super quick edit on the color HERE

Image #3 Your color is way off here, she looks orange. Also the pose is not doing this little girl any justice, her belly is making her look like a little chubby girl, even though she clearly is not. Re-shoot , re-crop or delete.

Image #4 This one would be nice if you had some catchlights in the eyes, they look dead and soulless. A reflector or fill flash would have worked wonders for this one. Also the DOF is off some, the little girl is in focus, mom is in focus but dad is starting to fade in sharpness. Also edit out the tree branch coming out of the side of Dad’s head.

Image #5 – Why is this image so wide? what is the point of interest here, thelake in the background or the no-so impressed kids on the porch bench? The kids look really bored as if you were not engaging them for the shoot but just there to “snap” pictures. Lose the black and white. B&W looks good if there is contrast or texture or something, in this example, it does nothing for this image, sorry.

Image #6 This is my last one, any more is wasting my time. The DOF is all wrong on this. For one, you are too close to your subjects making your DOF confusing. The focus point looks like it is on the girls boob, not her eyes and by her expression, it looks like she knows it. Again a reflector or fill flash with a slightly lower exposure would have done wonders for the dresses and the dark spots under all of their eyes.

Your not hopeless, but making several basic mistakes that would drive you to be a full time Pro-Faux, if you don’t improve. You need to be aware of your surroundings, adjust poses to make the best of them and compliment your subjects.
Your color management needs to be a lot better. Make mental notes when shooting of what color things are in real life so you can use them as reference points when editing. Saturation is not always a good thing.
Learn your focus points for your camera and learn to control and utilize the light around you better. Focus on your subjects eyes, give them life, they should not be a deep dark black abyss.

That is all.