C&C WB, Saturation, PP techniques

[Village_Idiot]

This is Taylor, my next door neighbor's kid. I was out side Saturday when they were playing and said I'd snap some shots and have them printed out for them.

Here's a good one I got. Tried to meter it to her sweatshirt but I don't think it worked. It came out over exposed, but not so much of the photo was blown out. I dropped the exposure down a bit, turned up the shadows, upped the saturation a few notches and played with the brightness. I think I upped it just a little bit to compensate for the exposure decrease, trying not to lose any of the depth from the shadows and darker parts of the picture.
All in all, what's your thoughts on the technical aspects of how the photo turned out after PP? I normal shoot bands and stuff like that, so I'm not so practiced at actually taking picture with adequate light now http://www.vwvortex.com/vwbb/smile.gif . This isn't being sold to any body or isn't being used to make money, so the framing and everything else isn't so important to me as having the colors and general look of the photo turn out. OK, enough of the excuses...
Exposure: 0.001 sec (1/1000)
Aperture: f/4
Focal Length: 50 mm
ISO Speed: 100

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/175/417844195_ae9ce22f2f_o.jpg

[strmrdr]

it would have taken fill flash and a different angle to get that shot.

With the PP its a so-so snapshot they will likely like it.

[Village_Idiot]

it would have taken fill flash and a different angle to get that shot.

With the PP its a so-so snapshot they will likely like it.

The sun was behind me, so it would have been hard to do much besides move a few steps to the right

[Hellashot]

The sweatshirt is not over exposed. You barely have light touching the right edge of the histogram. In fact I find the picture a little flat (dull). I did a quick fix but cannot post because you don't allow it. Contrast can be increasted along with overall brightness and saturation a little too. I find it difficult to have a bright, contrasty image with "pop" without having a little bit of overexposure (histogram climing up the right edge a little)

[Village_Idiot]

The sweatshirt is not over exposed. You barely have light touching the right edge of the histogram. In fact I find the picture a little flat (dull). I did a quick fix but cannot post because you don't allow it. Contrast can be increasted along with overall brightness and saturation a little too. I find it difficult to have a bright, contrasty image with "pop" without having a little bit of overexposure (histogram climing up the right edge a little)

meh, must not have saved it.

I cranked the exposure down a good bit when I opened the RAW up. I can post the original.

[feilb]

Here is a real quick edit:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/184/420462294_1208cd1860_o.jpg

Adjusted contrast, saturation and hue selectively, cropped it to a more realistic ratio.

As much as you say you dont really care about the background, you should. The cluttered background here makes the difference between a snapshot and a really great photograph.

[Village_Idiot]

Here is a real quick edit:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/184/420462294_1208cd1860_o.jpg

Adjusted contrast, saturation and hue selectively, cropped it to a more realistic ratio.

As much as you say you dont really care about the background, you should. The cluttered background here makes the difference between a snapshot and a really great photograph.

That's good. I would worry about it more so if it was something I was planning on selling or using in a portfolio. It's kind of hard because the development has houses and cars every where, so the only other way to shoot would have been up.