Outdoor Night Portrait

[cloudless]

Camera: Canon EOS 300D
Lens: EF 50mm F1.8
ISO: 1600
No flash, no tripod.

The full set can be found in my gallery:
http://cloudless.net/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=84

[KevC]

Looks like camera shake, is your shutter speed fast enough? For night portraits, it's difficult to handhold. Try sitting down and resting your elbows on your knees. Also, invest in an tri/monopod is a good idea! I really love the second one, the colour hues are very moody.

The first one, try not to crop hands and fingers out. Either have them in the frame, or cut them straight below the elbow. If they're cut right at the wrist, it makes it seem like a careless mistake! Not really photographically attractive.

The second one, the background is slightly busy on the right, try cropping that out. It's a nice "rule" to have the subject looking into the frame, and having her dead centre is quite "boring".

Good luck, and keep shooting!

//edit: Just had a look at your gallery. I really liked some of the other pictures!

[PhotosGuy]

I like the 1st one in your gallery.

[MCB]

I like the second one. I'm not sure why. I think it's partly the color and partly her face. The way she seems to be looking off into the distance with... well, the facial expression is open to interpretation, I suppose. Maybe that's what interesting about it. The picture makes me wonder what she's thinking. I like the shadows on her face, and the way her hair is covering one eye. Great pose. I think the color really adds to the mood, along with her expression, and has a great feel. The image is a little soft, though, but that adds to the effect somehow.

There are some purple lights in the background off to the right of the subject. If you could selectively color those to be the same yellow as everything else it would be good. I think that other color there is distracting from the subject. I want to look at her, but my eyes keep popping over to those lights.

I know shooting at night is hard, so given the difficult circumstances, good job! :lol:

[Hellashot]

White balance seems to be off on both along with too long an exposure for handheld. Metering seems off on #2.

[tim]

The color cast's horrible in both of them, and neither is sharp. The quite like the 2nd one, if the lighting were better it would be a great shot.