Looks are deceiving

[Rainey]

She may look like a little angel but my neice is a naughty little terror in reality. I snapped this shot on Sunday, which is the first time I have seen her in person for over a year... a lot has changed since then!

[Laurie]

the look sorta says, "I didnt do it, but if I did what are you gonna do about it?"
Nice portrait, nice bokeh too however her right shoulder is kind of distracting as the rest of her body is OOF.
Is that the 50mm 1.# or 85mm 1.#?

or neither ;D

did you also use a diffuser on the flash. the flash in the eyes looks fairly large and rounder than i would of expected.

[Rainey]

Thanks Laurie, I like your comment!

The shot was taken with my 50mm at F2.8 using only natural light coming in from the front windows of the house (no flash, I don't have one). Now that you mention it, those hotspots in her eyes are slightly distracting.

[Geoff]

I like this portrait cos it's different - there is definately a real element of a 'strong personality' in this shot. I think it would work equally well as a B&W and a slightly tighter crop.

[Rainey]

Thanks Geoff, I will try that tonight. Currently the shot has not been post-processed at all, so I might be able to improve it somewhat. I have a few other shots that I liked, but they don't seem as polished as my first one. Feel free to give me some feedback on them:

My DOF was too narrow in this shot and I lost a lot of sharpness around her right eye. Disappointed with that because I think the rest of the shot works well.


I also liked the timing of this capture (we had just dressed her and encouraged her to do a twirl), however the background is distracting and her expression is a bit awkward.