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First Portrait


hershy314

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My brother, his wife and one of their kids to pick up a boat we had given them. They'd get more use out of it than we would. While they was here I had my nephew get in the boat and take his pic. I have never took anyone's photo before, but always wanted to try it. I like how this came out, but some pointers would be nice.
_MG_7654s.jpg
 

Hoogle

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You do not get a sense that he is near water, other than the fishing rod that is!!

I would have blurred the background with a lower depth of field zoom, also using a bounce card / reflector on the ground to light the face up more especially the eyes.

If you read anything on Portraits or look at really good 1s you see the eyes tend to be the main focus his look a bit lost and dark here. A simple light Bounce or fill flash would have fixed that.

Positioning your model to set the scene better would of done a lot of justice to this pic but then I guess you can't always have ideal surroundings.

Not a bad pic for a 1st time.
 

hershy314

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You do not get a sense that he is near water, other than the fishing rod that is!!

I would have blurred the background with a lower depth of field zoom, also using a bounce card / reflector on the ground to light the face up more especially the eyes.

If you read anything on Portraits or look at really good 1s you see the eyes tend to be the main focus his look a bit lost and dark here. A simple light Bounce or fill flash would have fixed that.

Positioning your model to set the scene better would of done a lot of justice to this pic but then I guess you can't always have ideal surroundings.

Not a bad pic for a 1st time.

Well we was in my back yard, that's why you don't get the feeling he was near water. I just thought having my nephew climb in the boat and hold the fishing pole would make for a nice photo. The depth of field was as low as I could get it with my one and only lens. If this was a paid gig I would have tried to get everything right, but things like a reflector I just don't have. I do agree with the eyes, they are a little dark. This was done quickly. I do like how it came out, never done it before. Thanks for the insight.
 

Tom Mann

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Hi Andrew -

Two thoughts:

1) The image you posted was in the ProPhoto RGB color space. Any software that is not color managed will make the colors look absolutely horrible. For example, the forum software that produces in-line previews made it look like this:

2016-08-27_081342-screen_grab.jpg

whereas correctly color managed software will display it as you undoubtedly intended it, ie,

_MG_7654s-tjm01-ps01a-01_orig_correct_colors.jpg

The bottom line is that one should ALWAYS double check that you are posting to the web in sRGB, not any other color space.

2) Personally, I find the background vastly too cluttered. Most rules in photography are meant to be broken, but one that should almost never be broken is the rule: "If it doesn't contribute to the image, get rid of it." So, personally, I would have simplified the background and cropped the image to something like this. I think most people (eg, purchasers of stock photography) would find this much more appealing, and not reminiscent of a snapshot. BTW, pls. ignore my lousy 15 second selections, abrupt transition to OOF of the fishing rod, etc. I'm just trying to generally convey how I would have preferred to see it.

_MG_7654s-tjm01-ps02b_cropped-01.jpg


Cheers,

Tom M
 

hershy314

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I did wonder why the photo looked so different on here than it did in Lightroom or 500px. I really should have cropped the photo, no idea why I didn't. I don't mind what you did with the photo Tom Mann, the cropping looks fine. At least I have a better idea of what to do next time. You mentioned a color manager software, what would you recommend.
 

IamSam

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Sorry Andrew..............while it does appear less green on the other site, please don't post links there.
 

Tom Mann

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Sorry, but these last few posts (ie, those triggered by Imagecolorist's post) are superfluous because we've already discussed and resolved the color issue. Obviously, Imagecolorist either didn't read the earlier posts in this thread or didn't understand them.

As I explained in my earlier post, you incorrectly posted a version of your image in the ProPhoto color space in both forums. The display software on the other site obviously knows how to handle ProPhoto images, whereas our display software doesn't know what to do with such a file, so our software incorrectly assumes it's in the least common denominator color space, sRGB and displays the wrong colors. Thus, the color appears fine over there, but not here. This is true whether the ProPhoto image is posted directly here or posted as a link to that site.

If you want people (who may be using older, non-color managed browsers or other software, eg, forum software) to think well of your image, I **strongly** suggest that you replace the version of the image on the other site with an sRGB version, and, in the future, make sure that *everything* you post on the web is always in the sRGB color space.

The reason the colors in my tweaked version of your image that I posted here looks almost identical to the version on the other website is because I converted your image to sRGB before I cropped it, performed my other manipulations on it, and then posted it here.

Tom M
 
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Tom Mann

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PS - I just noticed your question to me in Post #5 in this thread: "...You mentioned a color manager software, what would you recommend?..." Sorry, but I didn't see you question till today.

The short answer is that there is no such thing as "color manager" software.

However, there is software that is "correctly color managed". For example, all of the Adobe products are in this category. This means that they correctly interpret image files in color spaces other than sRGB and display the colors correctly (ie, according to international standards). There is no single piece of software that performs the function of a "color manager" (ie, makes other, non-color managed software and hardware work correctly).

Color management is a entire process that includes software as well as stand-alone hardware calibrators and test targets to calibrate monitors, printers and cameras, as well as those devices themselves. The process also includes files know as "color profiles" that translate one set of colors into another.

Most importantly is that the overall process must be implemented and maintained by a person who is competent to do so. It's not a simple topic. If someone is a newbie in this area, the best advice I can offer is to always work in sRGB and forget the other color spaces. The advantages the other color spaces potentially offer just are not worth the risk of seriously mucking up the colors in your images and not even realizing it.

The best / simplest description of the overall color management process that I have seen is this write-up:

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/color-management1.htm

HTH,

Tom M
 
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fredfish

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This may well be a situation where rules are meant to be broken as I am not sure this suggestion improves on TomManns suggestion but have you heard of the "Rule of Thirds"? This says that the human eye somehow naturally prioritises items that fall on lines that are on a grid divided into 9 (think Naughts and Crosses - or in the USA Tic-Tac-Toe grid).

The rule would suggest that the eyes in a picture are ideally placed in a portrait when they appear in one of the intersections.

Have a look at this -

thirds.jpg

You can get the grid lines to show in Photoshop by selecting the crop tool and then selecting "rule of thirds" from the grid type - then click somewhere in the grid.

As I said this is all subjective as I am not sure in this case that this improves on Toms crop - but I thought I would share the info.

Final image cropped to rule of thirds.

rot 2.jpg

Cheers

John
 

Tom Mann

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Good point, John.

As I recall, in my crop, I think I had the left-right position of his eyes centered on one of the vertical rule-of-third lines, but I opted for including more of his torso because I wanted to make him look taller, not be cut off at his waist, and show more of his environment.

That being said, I really like your crop, as well. I think that this is one of those cases where we are down to a matter of preference, and, if applicable, whichever version best fits the space allotted to it on the website or publication.

Cheers,

Tom M

PS - I'm having a senior moment: John??? ... but your user name starts with "Fred". I'll never keep that straight. It's sort of like our "MrTom", whose real name isn't, Tom. At least I don't try to confuse you guys, LOL. My real name actually is, Tom.
 

fredfish

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PS - I'm having a senior moment: John??? ... but your user name starts with "Fred". I'll never keep that straight. It's sort of like our "MrTom", whose real name isn't, Tom. At least I don't try to confuse you guys, LOL. My real name actually is, Tom.

Its a bit of an homage to my early Amiga days - back in the early 90's there was a Canadian guy who created collections of Public Domain software and his name was Fred Fish - this was in the day when CDs had to be put in caddies and cost a fortune (I remember paying £10 + for a single blank CD and having to drive 20 - 30 miles to somewhere that sold them). A few years ago I was trying to think of an email address that people would remember remember but wouldn't necessarily identify me - I chose freddiethefish@*******.

Unfortunately the original Fred Fish has passed on - if you ever fancy a bit of non PS reading head over to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Fish

Oh and BTW I get the senior moments as well!!

Cheers John (AKA Fred ;) )
 

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