My first E-session

[tysrsx1]

Here are two shots from my first engagement session. These are two friends of mine who are great people. I did not charge anything for these shots, as I do not think my skills or IQ are ready for that. So Please offer any C&C that would be beneficial.

[tysrsx1]

WOW IQ went to crap after I posted these.

[sherijohnson]

love the 2nd one a LOT :)

[sctbiggs]

first one is out of focus. standard portrait shot. the second is good. would like to have seen both them and her ring in focus. Ring looks either out of focus or blurry due to motion. So, if it's the later, faster shutter speed would help.

[jdhart73]

Isnt that her right hand in the 2nd one???

[fullcity]

First one shutter speed is too slow (1/15) which may explain the slight blurriness. I would have pumped up the ISO to 800 to compensate and get the SS up to 1/60 at least. Also not too crazy about the background roof (?), it blends into her hair and there is no separation, making it draw the attention away. Go easy with the open aperture; I don't know what distance you were at, but f/2.8 on a 55mm lens at 5 feet away gives a DoF of an inch and a half, which may also have played a factor in the ring being out of focus. I'm sure you could've stopped down more and still gotten good bokeh. White balance seems off too.

Second one is much better, though not too crazy about the crop (never been a fan of "brain surgery" crops).

[tysrsx1]

Thank you all for the input! I did not mention that I was dealing with an extremely challenging situation during this shoot. It was as cloudy and dreary as one could imagine without it actually raining, plus it was getting very late in the day and shady to boot! Being that we are fiends I offered to do a few shots and if we could not get the desired quality, we would re-shoot. I agree on having too slow of a shutter, I am always afraid of going to 800 ISO because of noise, but in retrospect, I wish that I would have done so. This was also my first time out with the 17-55 and I was getting broken in with it. And the white balance, there was alot of yellow to contend with because of the leaves. I am however having trouble getting proper color and exposure recreation on prints and jpeg saves. I think my monitor needs calibrated. And why does the color change when I save in a jpeg format in photoshop elements?

[fullcity]

And the white balance, there was alot of yellow to contend with because of the leaves. I am however having trouble getting proper color and exposure recreation on prints and jpeg saves. I think my monitor needs calibrated. And why does the color change when I save in a jpeg format in photoshop elements?

There's some debate (at least among some of the photogs I talk with) about how important accurate color is for portraiture; those that disagree with me feel that during the editing process, one can easily compensate for white balance to taste, that artistic license takes precedence over accuracy. My feeling is that I'd rather have close to true colors as possible, then alter the color balance depending on what I like.

There are plenty of discussions on this site about how to get accurate colors, and it starts in-camera, then proceeds to your monitor, and finishes with your prints. If you are having problems with AWB (and it sounds like you are), you can use the custom white balance feature of your XSi (shoot a gray card or similar) or have your subject hold a gray card (white will do in a pinch) and correct in post. If the lighting changes significantly, you'll need to redo this process. Hope this helps.

On the edited image, I just used PSE's Remove Color Cast option. Is this more accurate? I have no idea, but it does look a little less yellow to me.

[DocMike]

My feeling is that I'd rather have close to true colors as possible, then alter the color balance depending on what I like.


I'm very much an amateur, but I agree with this wholeheartedly. My first impression was that the original #1 was way too warm. The edit is a little bit better, though maybe a little too desaturated (though I'm sure that's because it was just a quick edit to remove the color cast.)

Shooting in raw allows some very easy manipulation of color temperature, but always best to get it as close to right, to begin with. I'll even chimp a few shots in order to get a good white balance, assuming there's nothing with which to do a custom WB.

[DocMike]

fithe second is good. would like to have seen both them and her ring in focus. Ring looks either out of focus or blurry due to motion. So, if it's the later, faster shutter speed would help.

Second shot is 1/40s, f/2.8 at 55mm.
Might have been a good time to go for the 50 f/1.8 that the OP has.

[fullcity]

I'm very much an amateur, but I agree with this wholeheartedly. My first impression was that the original #1 was way too warm. The edit is a little bit better, though maybe a little too desaturated (though I'm sure that's because it was just a quick edit to remove the color cast.)

Shooting in raw allows some very easy manipulation of color temperature, but always best to get it as close to right, to begin with. I'll even chimp a few shots in order to get a good white balance, assuming there's nothing with which to do a custom WB.

Hey, I'm an amateur too (just with some nice gear that I try and justify to myself that I'm worthy of). It's all good, when we try to help each other out. And you're right, the edit was intended only to try to fix the color cast, but boosting the saturation is a good idea and one I should have done.:o How about, as my profs used to say, we leave that as an exercise for the OP? :)

Shooting RAW, definitely. You can correct all kinds of problems in post if you just shoot RAW. With memory cards so cheap, I can't see a reason why one would not do so.