Portraits, circa 1987

[rokkstar]

Right then,

Trying out some portrait work again. I would appreciate some C&C about these. THey are only two of the many I took. Please, as always, be brutally honest.




Cheers

[DJXtreme]

i quite like the second one. in my opinion the crop on the first one is too tight.

[Matt. K]

Matt
You are a creative SOB! These are difficult to critique because they've got a lot going for them. They are not perfect but right on the edge of being excellent. I can only give a personal opinion but to me the face is too bright...the poses are great. Can I suggest you try something similar but underexpose the face by about 1 stop. That would give the image more mood. Try for dark, sombre, expressive using the same props. Also make the background darker...nearly black. I'm stretching you here

[rokkstar]

Thanks for the comments guys.

Matt, thank you so much for the detailed critique, it really helps. And as far as stretching me.....it's great because it's setting me technique challenges that I'm trying to accomplish.

I agree that perhaps the face is a bit too bright, on my home monitor it looks ok, but my work one is properly calibrated and its intense!!

Many thanks chaps.

[wendellt]

hi matt

nice mood achieved, the 2nd one works best but i don't know if it was intentional to light sam front on, rather than higher prob because of the shadow that would of been produced by the hat
but sometimes that shadow can play into the overall composition you dont have to see the eyes for instance, working on the pose you could get her to do a more flirtatious pose fingers on hat tilting it downwards somewhat with a smart quirk in the smile

anyway style is excellent

[Oneputt]

I agree with MattK a black background, but I quite like the light on the bottom of the face in the first.

[sirhc55]

In the second shot I would like to see more shadow below the hat rim and in the eye section - this would take it from the 80’s to the 40’s

[OGreatOne]

[color=darkblue]Hi Rokkstar
1.the purple tinge around the eyes resulting from the uplighting used which is reflected from the inside of the brim of the hat....caught my attention in both pics
2.the dark top the beautiful girl...(who has great almond shaped eyes, beautiful bridge to her nose and glamazon of full lips) is wearing...has faded into the abyss
3.if handy use another light for the background to create some depth of field
4.if the hat is a feature of the shoot...try to emphasise it by adding light shaping either by another light source or refect
5.the neck muscle is to extreme and pronounced
6.i understand your lighting approach from underneath...because of style of hat
all in all, i only give an OGO Rating of smilies out of 5
I would like to see your next shoot with the lady usind her super facial features and show more skin on ther shoulders....(to have a triangular vision of compsition and emphasise the style) your artistic theme and try some side lighting