The skateboarder

[simply amazing]

hi all. i'm new in shooting/processing people, so please bare with me. if you have any tips or advice i can use for future reference, please do not hesitate to post. i decided to process this photo because i liked how he is "framed" by the people. this is my one and only shot, so i got lucky with my timing.

C&C is always welcome!

http://digitallyabsolute.com/images/skateboarder.jpg

[bobinatcat]

very nice colours in the shot!

seems he isnt enough of the focus point though

[simply amazing]

very nice colours in the shot!

seems he isnt enough of the focus point though
yea i took this from a moving car :p. i can't remember the EXIF data from the top of my head, but i had to adjust quickly and shoot

[ypx3]

very nice colours in the shot!

seems he isnt enough of the focus point though

I agree. If one was more skilled with ps than I, they could blur the rest of the scene a little and maybe crop a little to make him the focal point. Otherwise I love love the colors and the expressions of the people in the foreground
Very nice picture from a moving car indeed.

[byronling]

how are you getting such great colors? saturation?

[simply amazing]

I agree. If one was more skilled with ps than I, they could blur the rest of the scene a little and maybe crop a little to make him the focal point. Otherwise I love love the colors and the expressions of the people in the foreground
Very nice picture from a moving car indeed.
thanks for the comment and the tips. i'll try both cropping and blurring and see how it comes out.

how are you getting such great colors? saturation?
yup.. saturation/desaturation of selective colors

[blam]

great color, but the pedestrians are distracting from the skateboarder

[jwwill0]

Just change the title to "The Pedestrians"

[simply amazing]

great color, but the pedestrians are distracting from the skateboarder

Just change the title to "The Pedestrians"

lol thats true. never thought about it that way since i was really shooting for the skateboarder.. oh well, "The pedestrians" it is! :D

[malla1962]

I find this shot very interesting.:D:D

[Dorman]

Sharpness, Color, Contrast, and Processing are all excellent here. Unfortunately the subject isn't the focus of the shot, seems to be the fella that's lookin' directly at the camera.

[woodsie]

I like the shot, but as other people have said, the skateboarder is not the focus. There are various reasons for this.
The crop, the skater is a tiny part of the shot.
Colours, the eye is drawn to bright colours. You have the misfortune that in this shot the skater is wearing dark colours against a dark busy background, and half the pedestrians in the foreground are wearing white, and one of the ladies is carrying a big white bag.
The people in the foreground appear to be more in focus than the skater. I am guessing then that you are using all the focus points on your camera, which will automatically focus on the closest thing. I prefer to only use the centre point in most circumstances, manually selecting alternate focus points, or all, when necessary.
DOF, once you have the focus accurate, a wider aperture giving a shallower depth of field, the subject would stand out from the background and foreground more.With some very crude messing with selective brightening/darkening, blurring/sharpening and saturation, here is an example of what I mean.

[simply amazing]

I find this shot very interesting.:D:D
thanks.

Sharpness, Color, Contrast, and Processing are all excellent here. Unfortunately the subject isn't the focus of the shot, seems to be the fella that's lookin' directly at the camera.
thank you for the comment. i kinda wish that person didn't look straight at the camera, but it was a one shot deal, and i had to take what i got :(

I like the shot, but as other people have said, the skateboarder is not the focus. There are various reasons for this.
The crop, the skater is a tiny part of the shot.
Colours, the eye is drawn to bright colours. You have the misfortune that in this shot the skater is wearing dark colours against a dark busy background, and half the pedestrians in the foreground are wearing white, and one of the ladies is carrying a big white bag.
The people in the foreground appear to be more in focus than the skater. I am guessing then that you are using all the focus points on your camera, which will automatically focus on the closest thing. I prefer to only use the centre point in most circumstances, manually selecting alternate focus points, or all, when necessary.
DOF, once you have the focus accurate, a wider aperture giving a shallower depth of field, the subject would stand out from the background and foreground more.With some very crude messing with selective brightening/darkening, blurring/sharpening and saturation, here is an example of what I mean.
your edit looks very promising if i applied it to the hi-res file. thank you for taking the time to do that.

this shot was taken from sitting inside a moving vehicle, so i only had one chance. i saw the kid at the crosswalk, but by the time we passed by, he was already down the street, where you see him in the picture. center point focus was used to take this shot.

the settings were:
40mm
1/200 sec
f/9.0
160 ISO

since i didn't have much time to play with the settings, i only thought to adjust the shutter speed.. if i had more time to react, a wider aperture would have really helped with the shot like you mentioned, but it just didnt cross my mind