tainkc Loc: Kansas City

I seem to do better in natural light when it comes to portraiture. That thing Russ taught me about doing the half moon shooting has paid off in spades. I applied a couple of other techniques that were suggested to me.

I shot this in the afternoon golden hour. I tried this at ISO 100 and reviewing through the LCD, I felt I had too much shadow for what I wanted. I bumped the ISO to 400 and this is the result.

This is Sara, the mother of two of my grandsons. She too is a captive model, which helps.

I have a round shadow in the lower right that I kept screwing up every time I tried to remove it. I am not to worried about backgrounds at this point. It is the lighting and clarity that I am after for now.

50mm F1.8 prime shot at F5 @ 1/320 sec. ISO 400 No flash.

BHC Loc: Strawberry Valley, JF, USA

I really like the picture, but I see the problem at the lower right. I would like to suggest an out-of-the-box solution, a different way to eliminate at least part of the problem. Put Sara in an oval frame with fading edges (maybe 20-30 pixels wide). At that point, a bit of soft cloning may take care of the rest of the problem.

dirtpusher Loc: tulsa oklahoma

man those eyes look right through yuh. good shot!

tainkc Loc: Kansas City

I don't know if that will work. She has a round face as it is. I tried a few tools in photoshop but the results of my cloning looked amateurish. I am usually ver good at this sort of thing. Maybe I was fatigued.

tainkc Loc: Kansas City

Thanks, Birthday Boy!

BHC Loc: Strawberry Valley, JF, USA

Cloning is best done on a large screen. I always clone a layer, use very small, mostly soft brushes and resample often. My biggest problem used to be in trying to clone shrubbery with too large a brush, not resampling enough and creating patterns. Cloning is NOT something you want to try when tired. You can do it; just remember to resample often (unless you want patterns).

hangman45 Loc: Hueytown Alabama

I used the adjustment brush and upped the exposure and reduced the shadows in the area in the lower right and was able to get rid of the shadow without looking like it was cloned worked pretty well took just a couple of minutes

tainkc Loc: Kansas City

Yep. Don't do it when tired. Like I said, I can probably clone or replace it but the background is not my main concern.

dirtpusher Loc: tulsa oklahoma

take everyone i get now.. lol

:thumbup:

Chuck_893 Loc: Lincoln, Nebraska, USA

I see several things here that bother me some. You already know that she has a round face, but the lighting is dead flat. Every part of her face is equally illuminated, so it accentuates the roundness. You have turned her slightly to her left, and that is good, because it tends to diminish the roundness a little, but what's really needed now is a main light source coming from her left (camera right) to put the right side of her face—the side toward the camera—into some shadow. That is called "short" lighting—lighting the side away from the camera—because it has a slimming effect. The greater the difference between the light and shadow, the greater the slimming effect. It can be done also with "subtractive" lighting—holding a large matte black card near the right side of her face (camera left) just out of frame, which sops up light and allows the left side to go brighter. That would have worked, I think, in this case, but it requires a light stand or an assistant, neither of which I bet you have—so, you does the best you can.

I also think the crop is too tight, which also tends to accentuate the fullness of her face. If you cropped this in camera with a 50mm that's a little short for a portrait lens, but I'm also going back to full-frame film cameras where we figured the minimum focal length for a portrait lens was 85mm, and that was for at least a full head-and-shoulders. Getting in this tight we'd want a 100mm. It's about perspective, and I don't want to go all techie on you, but generally with shorter lenses it's better to pull back for better perspective between nose and ears. (A 50 on a crop-sensor is proportionally longer.)

Her eyes are a gorgeous green (or is it hazel) but there is little sparkle. Her eyelids are dropping a slight shadow across the top of the eye so there is no catchlight. (Can't quite figure out why since the light is otherwise pretty flat.)

None of this is meant to say that it's a bad picture! Just that portraiture is a reeeeeaaaly tough animal, and the only way you get good at it is to keep doing it! :thumbup:

RMM Loc: Suburban New York

You can try cloning the shadow out by setting the clone tool to luminosity, then cloning again with it set to color. The combination will leave the underlying shape and texture, while making it consistent with the source. The hair will make it a bit more complicated.

photoninja1 Loc: Tampa Florida

I generally with Chuck 893. Assuming you have a crop sensor camera, a 50mm equates to about an 80mm FF and is appropriate for portraits, but a slightly longer lens would be a bit better for this subject. You could have achieved a short lighting effect by turning the girls face toward camera left, throwing shadow on the near side and lighting the far (narrow) side of the face. You would rotate the camera a bit to your left as well. A pop of flash, compensated about 2 f stops down would help fill the eye sockets and put some sparkle into the eyes. Or you could use a silver reflector. You did a great job of focusing on the eyes and controlling the background. Good solid camera work. The above are finer points to help you perfect your technique.

Bill Houghton Loc: New York area

A side from you camera and light effects. To take care for that shadow around her nose. The clone tool will work. Create another layer to work on, using Ctrl J. Set your cloning tool to about 30 percent Opacity, with a feather edge. take samples starting in the lighest area and work around to the darker area around her lips. Work slowly and take a lot of samples as you work way around. The you can take her in Liquify and play with her neck. I you would like I will post what I have done.

tainkc Loc: Kansas City

Excellent! Thanks, Chuck. You are not being hypercritical in the least. This is exactly the stuff I want to hear. This is why I am posting my portraiture on this forum.

I especially like the way you put in perspective (no pun intended) about using a 50mm lens. I don't have a 100mm lens but I do have a Carl Zeiss 70mm lens, but I don't like taking it outdoors.

I also have a problem with setups. Even though my models are free, their attention span is limited plus I don't have the wherewithal such as soft boxes, umbrellas etc. When I do use a reflector, it is a cookie sheet with tin foil wrapped around it.

Here is what I started out with: I have no idea where the shadow across her chest came from. I think it is from a lamp post near the street. I did do a walk around with her as Russ recommends but I did not like any of the shadows; too harsh in my opinion. And yes, I am using a crop sensor camera (ASP-C). But it is the thing about the lens that I am picking up from you. Thanks!

tainkc Loc: Kansas City

Yeah, I can play with that spot some more but my focus is on how well the portrait itself came out. I do kind of like that bit of hair hanging down through that spot.