Say Hello to Bianca

[Colin Southern]

With yesterday being my 2nd daughter's birthday, the inevitable weekend sleepover for a couple of her friends inevitably lead to the inevitable photoshoot and the inevitable free canvas for the parents!

Canon 1Ds3 with EF 70-200mm F2.8L IS USM II lens @ 142mm. F13 @ 1/125th @ ISO 100. Key + Fill + Hair lights + 2x Reflectors. Best viewed at 100%.

[arith]

Yet another good one.

[Colin Southern]

Yet another good one.

Thanks Steve,

She was actually a pretty easy model to work with

[rick55]

Very nice, Colin - nice pose, excellent tones. My only tiny nit would be the double (or maybe triple) catchlights in her eyes: maybe worth cloning some out?

Cheers,
Rick

[revi]

I'd say you'll get a lot more of your daughters' friends visiting soon...
Another very nice one

One small question though: why canvas?

Cheers

Remco

[Colin Southern]

Very nice, Colin - nice pose, excellent tones. My only tiny nit would be the double (or maybe triple) catchlights in her eyes: maybe worth cloning some out?

Cheers,
Rick

Hi Rick,

Thanks for that. I could have cloned some out, but to be honest, I don't mind them (I just wish they'd always go where I want them!)

[Colin Southern]

I'd say you'll get a lot more of your daughters' friends visiting soon...
Another very nice one

One small question though: why canvas?

Cheers

Remco

Thanks Remco,

To answer the question, I work pretty much 100% of the time with canvas mostly because it's cheaper to frame (which I do myself) ... traditional framing is very expensive.

[rpcrowe]

Lovely eyes...

[Alis]

Very nice portrait as usual, Colin!

My only comment: the hand skin tone looks weird. Not sure if it is because of too much vignetting?

[Colin Southern]

Very nice portrait as usual, Colin!

My only comment: the hand skin tone looks weird. Not sure if it is because of too much vignetting?

Hi Ali,

Thanks for that

I deliberately toned down the hands so that they don't draw the eye away from the face too much. Keeping in mind too that more of what you see here is wrapped around the side of the canvas frame, so isn't as obvious. If I don't de-emphasise the hands then Dave would have told me off!

Edit: Taking a 2nd look at it, I probably reduced it a bit much, although it looked OK on the canvas.

[Dave Humphries]

If I don't de-emphasise the hands then Dave would have told me off!

Edit: Taking a 2nd look at it, I probably reduced it a bit much, although it looked OK on the canvas.

You're correct on both counts

(but I must be losing my touch)

[Colin Southern]

You're correct on both counts

(but I must be losing my touch)

Yeah

To be honest Dave, I usually don't retweak any shots like this for web display (I'm too lazy!) ... so what I put up here is usually the print version -- and print versions compress the tonal range quite a bit so things like that don't make as big a difference (if anything one has to emphasize them even more so that they DO make a difference).

[Maritimer1]

Besides the beauty of the young lady and the way you've captured her eyes and skin, I'm looking at the overall compostion and noting the placement of the eyes, shoulder, hands etc. Do you deliberately ask your subjects to let a hand show for effect? I loved the Barry Doig shot with the camera in hands. I'm thinking that having another element (ie hand/hands/object) in the portrait makes a nice statement and provides more impact.

Myra

[Colin Southern]

Besides the beauty of the young lady and the way you've captured her eyes and skin, I'm looking at the overall compostion and noting the placement of the eyes, shoulder, hands etc. Do you deliberately ask your subjects to let a hand show for effect? I loved the Barry Doig shot with the camera in hands. I'm thinking that having another element (ie hand/hands/object) in the portrait makes a nice statement and provides more impact.

Myra

Hi Myra,

Do I pose the models? Yes -- very much so for this kind of shot. I usually start by sitting them down and getting them to point their legs either towards the side wall, or even further around -- then turn their shoulders towards me -- then the head (most important) - and finally the eyes. With kids it can be a bit of a struggle to (eg) get them to move their eyes without moving their head - and often one has to go back to step one if they can't turn far enough and I'm left with a nose obscuring an eye etc - but that's basically the way I do it.

Having props makes a BIG difference too.

With regards to the hands ... in this type of shot it's good to have a way to pull the front of the top down a bit so that the hoodie hugs the line of the face - and putting one hand over the other tends to make for a nice composition too.

I've used the same technique here (and also put a brick wall to good effect -- good backgrounds are something that folks often overlook)



If one doesn't pull the hoddie down you get something like this -- which is still fine -- but it's a different shot altogether