Fred

[DougR]

This is a portrait of a good friend of mine.



C&C always welcome

Doug

[Digital]

Doug, this is a nice portrait. IMHO, I would add a tad of light to the right side of his face, especially the eye.



Bruce

[Shadowman]

Nice portrait.

[IzzieK]

Doug, did you hit him with a frying pan the left eye or something...??? joking...the left side eye need a little bit of brightening...honest.

[DougR]

Something like this...

[gregj1763]

That looks much better Doug.
Nice one

[IzzieK]

Yes Doug...much, much better...

[bnnrcn]

You made me laugh so much Isabel..What a comment !

Doug, did you hit him with a frying pan the left eye or something...??? joking...the left side eye need a little bit of brightening...honest.

[bnnrcn]

The revised version looks better Doug, nice image

[DougR]

I think it looks a little too light now. It got late last night and I ran out of time. I will spend some more time on it when I get a chance. Thanks for the input all. Izzie was right, looked like he got hit with a frying pan.

Doug

[Dave Humphries]

I think it looks a little too light now. It got late last night and I ran out of time. I will spend some more time on it when I get a chance.

Hi Doug,

I agree, it looks a tad too light to me now.

I also wondered about the framing - playing about moving the Lytebox off the edges of my screen - I am tempted to suggest cropping to the edge of his collar, losing a fair bit off right hand side of picture. Perhaps even to the door frame behind - although, since this isn't vertical, it predicates a clockwise rotation might be wise first.

Hope that helps, Dave

[DougR]

I agree Dave. I had wondered about a crop and just tried it to the collar and it makes a ton of difference. I will try the rotation as well when I get a chance. Good call.

Thanks.

Doug

[DougR]

Dave, this is a preliminary, I didn't do the rotation to correct the door jam behind yet but I like the crop, thoughts?

Fred is currently under hospice care having lost his battle with cancer. He is a good friend, whom I've known for a while. He worked for me, although his argument would be that just the opposite was true. He is a fine, gentle man that reminded me of my Father. I have another photo of him that I am currently working on.

[Rob Ekins]

Doug,
I think you may have over done the CL eye socket. The lighting fall off does not look natural.
In your second image the subjects pupil is lighter in the lower third, brighten it all up and add a catch light like the CR eye and the image could have a different dynamic.

[rpcrowe]

It looks to me (on my monitor) that you shot with a very wide aperture allowing the thinnest DOF. His chin and beard look like the focus point with the eye or eyes falling just a TAD soft.

[DougR]

Yes, shot with an 85mm, wide open on a T3I. Very thin DOF.

[shreds]

Doug, It seems a tad light to me too. Your friend has a wonderful weathered look and a slightly darker finish might help? Searched around and ended up finding IMHO that a sepia look suited the shot well.



Hope you don't mind..

[Dave Humphries]

Dave, this is a preliminary, I didn't do the rotation to correct the door jam behind yet but I like the crop, thoughts?

Hi again Doug,

Your crop is just tight enough that the need to rotate is pretty much removed.

Yes I think it looks better.

Regarding focus/DoF, it does appear that the moustache and eye brows are a bit sharper than either eye ball, but I also see some motion blur in the beard (I guess Fred was talking), so a narrower aperture probably wasn't an option.

With such a thin DoF, it is, in my limited experience, almost impossible to get the exact thing you'd want pin sharp when shooting candidly - i.e. a posed model in a studio is under direction and the photographer has the benefit of taking time to get it right.

It is a good shot, well done, Dave