B&W - My Wife

[Raj]

here's a portrait of my wife in BW (which i accidentally posted in landscape section, hope my first mistake can be excused). Dont know if this fits in traditional portrait catagory, however I visualized it might look good with sunshine on one side of face & BW......

[lomond]

Raj, you are one lucky man, that is a beautiful woman.

Now, I know this is not the critique section but what is the black bar on the left.
Also the lack of light from the right,maybe some fill flash or reflector would have helped.
I do like the depth of field and the subject is sharp enough.

Cameron

[Raj]

Thanks Cameron. I agree I am lucky & I enjoy the feeling all the time :-)
Well feel free to critize, thats what I am looking for.
OK, the shot was taken in a wooden structure on hill top where the wooden pillers & roof were preventing an even light. The black bar you mentioned is one of the piller edge. I agree it should not be there.
Regarding light, I could have made my wife pose such that her entire face was lit, but for some reason I found a half lit face more attractive at that time .... I just wanted to shoot something different with my sense of creativity in it. However I dont know traditional or expert compostion tricks yet so may be its a mess to professional eye...
Thanks for the comment on depth of field & sharpness, thats something I controlled manually
which means I am learning something :-)

[lomond]

Raj,
Please don't think me expert. If you want expert post in the critique section, there are some very knowledgable people there. I won't mention names for fear of embarrassing them.
However, I find that if you post in the critique section you will get some fair critique along with "I like it". Elswhere you will get I like along with "some critique".
Pay your money, take your choice.
Either way, enjoy the forum.

Hope to speak to you again.
Cameron

[marie]

absolutely love this shot of your wife Raj

[JulianoL]

Raj,

Nice shot. I would just crop the left a bit (to remove the wood) and sharpen it a little.

[Raj]

How about this, sharpened too much ?

[eosster]

I like the first one better, 2nd one is little over sharpened, IMHO.

[Ballen Photo]

Very nice Raj! :D
-Bruce

[JulianoL]

Raj,

The crop is ok, but the second one is over sharpened. Try to play with the settings.

[Raj]

Yes, I realized that.
I recently purchased Photoshop CS & am new to that, so could not fix photo well.
Will try again tomorrow.

Cheers

[Raj]

Here you go.
Changed foreground brightness a bit, cropped & sharpened a little.

[RickHulshof]

ok where's the drool emoticon (wink) great pic - really like the last version

[marie]

just beautiful Raj
she is beautiful

I love the picture, how her hair is blowing in the wind
the casual look overall

[Agaric]

ok where's the drool emoticon (wink) great pic - really like the last version
Ditto I like the last version.
Lucky guy too ;)
Good luck learning PSCS, this is the place to pic up tips on it.

[JulianoL]

Raj,

I like the last version, but I'll try to find a brightness setting between the first and last.

[mackb]

Great Picture. At first I thought the picture was fine the way you took it (minus the pilar on the left) but after you lightened it I noticed how much better it looked. Great job.

[Raj]

Thanks Juliano & Mackb for your comments.
AT first I though the same - untouched pic looks good, however a little bit of tweaking brings out better results. Now I have to learn both my camera & my photoshop ... post processing looks equally important.

Cheers