Back again

[Nic]

Hello again. I keep dipping in & out of this forum. I really like it, but my young kids (2yrs & 3 weeks) keep me so busy that I struggle to do more than read the forum most of the time. I'm definitely an amateur/wantabe photographer, but I'd really love your feedback. I'm interested in the post processes that people apply to their images, as well as tips for taking my shots. My subjects are most likely going to be my kids as I don't have any time without them. Hopefully when they're a bit older I'll have a bit more freedom to experiment.

This shot is of my new 3 week old son. I'm not in love with the composition, but unfortunately I haven't had a lot of time to play with the image. I picked this image because he's 'looking' at the camera, but unfortunately he moved his hand into the sunlight and it became very over exposed (hence the cropping). I've experimented with creating a coloured black (not sure the correct term), rather than just desaturating it. It has a slight purple tinge to it. I also experimented with high pass sharpening.

Anyway, your advice is very welcome. Although don't make me cry, I'm sleep deprived & hormonal

[Marko]

Hi Nic,

This is a cute shot for sure. I like the eye sharpness and those cutie little lips.

That said, as cute as it is....Given that the hand was overexposed and this image was cropped because of that, the whole composition of the image is off for me. And in this case, I just may start again.
I'm not at all crazy about the vertical position of the eyes here.

I'd try again and use soft diffuse window light and make sure there are no hotspots BEFORE i take the image. Try to get more light into the baby's eyes. (I forget if a baby's eyes have real colour at this point.)

Setting it up in camera will always be easier than post processing fixes unless u are a photoshop Guru.

Hope that may help - and hoping to see more images of this cutie.

[Nic]

Thanks Marko! The eyes were bothering me, but I couldn't quite work out why. You're right he had turned his head away from the window in that shot. His eyes are a very dark blue at the moment. As for the verticle position of the eyes, do you mean I shouldn't shoot him lying on his side? Should I shoot from above him instead?

I definitely don't want to photoshop mistakes, I'm more interested in enhancements that people apply. I'm going to try more shots later this week when my daughter is at preschool. Thanks for your feedback.

[Nic]

Hi again!

It's taken me more than a few weeks to get back to photographing as winter has caused havoc in my family this year. Today I managed to get a few hours to set up properly & take on board Marko’s advice. Thank you Marko! I think these shots are better, but still could be improved. Any advice is welcome. I’m still learning & found it so helpful last time.
This time I tried to improve the lighting. Note I got more light in his eyes. His eyes are a really dark blue, so they do still appear a bit dark. The light is from a window to the left. What’s the best direction for the light in these sorts of shots? I feel like the colour isn’t quite right in the colour photo, any suggestions?
I also tried to experiment with different angles, close ups and getting a connection with the subject using eye contact.
Thank you for any feedback. I know baby shots aren’t the most interesting. I love looking at everyone’s creative photographs. I’m trying to improve my photography & document my little man growing up at the same time.

Thanks again!
Nic

[Nic]

[Iguanasan]

Nic, those last three shots are keepers for sure as far as I'm concerned. I really like the light in the full body shot and the details in the close ups are very nice.

[Marko]

Hey Nic - Wow your boy has grown a bit. What a cutie!!!

Your best critiques will come when you post fewer pics per thread (1-2 is best).
Feel free to post as many threads as u like though.

Here goes a quick critique.

In general - every photographer is responsible for every single millimetre in the frame....and you need to be mentally aware and actively look at all those millimetres to make sure they "work". Don't just look at the boy and his eyes....look everywhere. The largest issue here is cropping imo.

First off be aware that any image that is uploaded directly that is 276k or more - it gets compressed and sharpness suffers.
Personally I upload images at about 200k and they look good. Calling the image from flickr is the other option and there is no size limit.

here goes:

Shot1 -I like the skin tones here and light overall. The eyes are a bit soft here....just a bit but it may be image compression. What you need to be aware of is where you crop. here you cropped through the fingers which is rarely an 'elegant' crop. I would have cropped through the stomach here.

shot 2 - funny cute expression. Cropping again is odd here for me. hands are very expressive - be careful where you crop. You also left lots of empty space around the boy. I would have cropped tighter here.

shot 3 - Lovely classic image. I'm cool with the colour here.

shot 4 - fab angle, love it. I'm getting niggly here but that's what i do. You cropped through the boys lip at the top of the frame. That's less elegant than showing all the lips or cropping 1/2 inch lower.

shot 5 -a very interesting and cool composition. Cropping the pinky not terrible here. Top left area is the brightest area in the image so our eye goes there and it should not. Burning it in is required here to remove this brightness distraction.

Hope that may help!

Marko

[Nic]

Thanks Iguanasan! I was trying to take some 'baby landscape' shots & look at the subject in a different way. He's my practise subject at the moment, shame he won't sleep so I don't have to worry about all the movement. It's good practise though.

[Nic]

Thank you Marko for all the great tips. Will work on making those changes now. I really appreciate your time.

[Nic]