Baby portrait

[Pc123]

Here is my latest. Shot w canon rebel 50mm f1.8 edited in lightroom 5
I'm an amateur so I thought this was pretty good, would love to hear a professional opinion.

[theantiquetiger]

First off, welcome to the forum!!!

As for the critique, you accomplished the hardest thing to do with babies, get them to look at the camera, nicely done. You have very nice bokah (blurred background). IMO, the crop is a little too tight in the bottom left corner. i would have liked to have seen a little more of the hand. The crop of the top of the baby's head is OK, i have no problem with that. The image appears a little soft (out of focus). A portrait this close should be super sharp. The eyes need to be crystal clear. The baby's skin has no texture. You can barely make out the bridge of the nose. I don't know if this is from the image being OOF or you smoothed the skin in Lightroom. In baby portraits, try not to touch the skin, they already have beautiful, flawless skin.

The baby's eyes are right on the middle line across the center of the image. Try not to divide the image in half with major parts of the image (her eyes in this case). Learn what "rule of thirds" is, use it to place eyes in portraits.

I would have shot this in portrait (up and down) not horizontal.

Recently, I have been shooting close up portraits of random people on the street, here is a couple examples. As you can see, the eyes are crystal clear, I didn't touch the skin, showing all the flaws. You can nearly count the eye lashes. I know the eyes in these images basically divide the images in half like your image, but each eye falls on the vertical lines of the "rule of thirds" cross.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7441/1...19634857_b.jpg

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3757/1...0f4ea47f_b.jpg

BTW, I am not a professional, I just started shooting three years ago. You should see the trash I was producing. If you are just starting out and you are already getting results like this, you are much further advanced than I was three years ago. Keep it up, practice, practice, practice, and post here for critiques. This is the best forum on the internet, I have learned a ton from these guys!!!

Do what I did, start with the basics. Learn composition, rule of thirds, exposure, lighting. Pick one subject at a time, work on it until you have it down, then move on to the next while using what you have learned in the previous subject.

[Marko]

Images posted directly to the forum need to be 1028 pixels or less and less than 325 K or the forum compresses.
(Personally I always upload at about 250k and 1000 pixels in width)

AT gives good critique, but i'd like to see the picture re-uploaded before I critique.

Also what was the shutter speed here?

Thx!

[theantiquetiger]

Images posted directly to the forum need to be 1028 pixels or less and less than 325 K or the forum compresses.
(Personally I always upload at about 250k and 1000 pixels in width)

AT gives good critique, but i'd like to see the picture re-uploaded before I critique.

Also what was the shutter speed here?

Thx!

Thanks Marko, I can never remember that number. I thought about that but saw the image was only 38KB in size (but now realize the image is 1029 px).

PC, a good thing to do is get a flickr page and upload to there so your images will not get compressed. Its free or if you pay something like $10 a year, you can store the large image, in case you lose your computer/images.

[theantiquetiger]

One more GREAT word of advice, concentrate on taking one image at a time. Make sure everything is perfect before hitting the button. Do not "spray and pray" (take 300 images in hopes you get a handful of good ones). This was one of my biggest problems starting out. The only time I still "spray and pray" is at my daughter's soccer games (but I am just learning sports photography).

"Chasing the Light" is very addictive, and once you start hitting the mark regularly, you will be hooked. I have dreams (nightmares) about photography, everything from taking an image that is world renowned, to my equipment getting stolen or (most recently) my equipment going underwater while I was trying to get a shot in the ocean.

[Pc123]

Thank you so much theantiquetiger. I really appreciate your feedback. You are right now that I see the image on big screen. I can see its a bit too soft and oof.

[theantiquetiger]

Thank you so much theantiquetiger. I really appreciate your feedback. You are right now that I see the image on big screen. I can see its a bit too soft and oof.

But remember, like Marko said, you may have uploaded too big. If you do this, the forum resizes it and makes it blurry. It needs to be 1028 pixels or less and less than 325 K

[chiphotography]

Just love these!! Great shots