A few (Kids/Family) portraits for CC

I don't really like shooting/editing portraits all that much to be honest. Probably because there is so much I don't know about getting them right (shot & editing) and composition seems to be so much harder than with something like landscape, in my opinion. However, this being a hobby for me and having a family kind of requires I do some from time to time

Anyways, looking for any CC - editing, composition, etc. etc... thank you!

(1)

Oh come on, nothin?

This is my second post this week to Critique that's not really had any attention. Should I be skipping the Critique forum from now on and go to Sharing instead??? Is it because of the new forum layout? Participation seemed quite a bit better in the past.

A little underexposed on my monitor.

Agree with the above poster - You need more room in your photos - the crops seem a little bit close to me.

Diane

I like your second pic...

I like the tight cropping, and the composition. They all seem a little under exposed.

on a tripod with remote shutter the 1/15 is ok,these look great to me,third is a bit under exposed but easily fixed,nice expressions and every one in focus,these all look great to me,the first one i may try a b/w as its just a bit soft.

First one are (imo) really good Second is a bit soft yes but I like the pose/surroundings.

Third one should be brighter, and I am not a big fan of cut of hands. Your hand, which only shows a tiny bit at bottom, should have been placed on your oldest kid. Together and all that jazz.

I cant really say, how your oldest kid should have placed his hands, depends on how else he could be standing, but I would have preferred them in the image too. Other than that - well done!

Brandon:

Overall, a nice set of photographs. I don't see any big "wow!" factor with them, but they would be displayed proudly on my desk at work.

A couple points:

The color balance is not consistent if you want these to be a "set" of any type. The Auto White Balance was not your friend for consistency here.
The ISO could have been bumped well above 100 (400 would have been fine for that body) to allow a faster shutter speed.

1) The first picture has your wife with a very pleasant look. I'm usually a fan of tight crops, and I think a vertical crop of her with the rule of thirds in play might have given it a better feel for me.
2) The pine tree is wrapping around on the right side of your son and wife. The in-focus needles and tree detail compete with your family for attention. The depth of field in your other shots keeps that problem away.
3) Ahhh. The classic "How to pose yourself after you compose and move yourself into the shot" challenge. You jumped into the frame and didn't have the ability to see how you could have connected the family with posing your hands and shoulder position. You're fairly square to the camera and don't look like you were integrated into the pose. By moving your right shoulder more toward the camera and possibly putting your right hand on son's arm or shoulder, the result may have been a stronger connection of the family unit.

Great effort for a difficult subject (family!).

Thanks for sharing your work!

Thanks all for the comments and suggestions!

I'm a little surprised (but no calibrated monitor, so maybe I shouldn't be) to see so many that say the shots are underexposed. I'm more used to doing landscape where it seems to be easier, or maybe you have more flexibility in exposure? It would makes sense for exposure to be more critical when doing portrait type stuff.

I'll take a second look at these and see what I can do, as well as a couple of the crops. I'm still trying to get used to the 85 on my 70d. I really like the images it produces but I'm not very good about framing with it yet.

vanilli wrote in post #17332213
First one are (imo) really good Second is a bit soft yes but I like the pose/surroundings.

Third one should be brighter, and I am not a big fan of cut of hands. Your hand, which only shows a tiny bit at bottom, should have been placed on your oldest kid. Together and all that jazz.

I cant really say, how your oldest kid should have placed his hands, depends on how else he could be standing, but I would have preferred them in the image too. Other than that - well done!

Re: Third one - I was playing around in PS on this one, specifically with the background to darken it up in an attempt to bring us out a little more. Do you think the exposure overall, even on the family, could stand to be bumped up? Yeah... the hands. I noticed this after the fact but at that point it was obviously too late. I'll try and pay more attention to it. Thanks for the feedback!

cpam.pix wrote in post #17333182
Brandon:

Overall, a nice set of photographs. I don't see any big "wow!" factor with them, but they would be displayed proudly on my desk at work.

A couple points:

The color balance is not consistent if you want these to be a "set" of any type. The Auto White Balance was not your friend for consistency here.

Good to know about the color balance and paying more attention to it. I didn't really intend for these to be a "set" but see how they could/should be thought of that way. To me I was really just showing some of my more recent shots and trying to get feedback on making them better.

I've been noticing this of my shots, thanks for pointing it out. I'm not spending enough time going through and checking or double checking everything. Specifically in the last shot, it was unfortunately rushed in between breaks in the rain with kids that didn't want to be standing still for a photo.

The pine tree... I noticed this too and tried to burn it a little in PS in an attempt to make it not so noticeable. Not sure if I could clone some out or what else in PS. I guess noticing it while shooting and re-positioning would have probably been best.

HAHA This is exactly right... I don't want to make excuses and I'll learn from this, but man, those kids didn't really want to be out there and we were getting ready to go somewhere and overall it was kind of rushed.

Thank you for the tips on positioning, appreciate it. I'll try and put more thought into it next time.

Updated the exposure on all 3... unfortunately I 'replaced' the ones I already posted instead of uploading separate copies, so no before/after to look at.

freestylee30 wrote in post #17337139
Updated the exposure on all 3... unfortunately I 'replaced' the ones I already posted instead of uploading separate copies, so no before/after to look at.

Lol, I'm just now looking at this thread for the first time and I kept going back to look at the photos wondering why everyone seemed to think they were so underexposed! I was like, yeah maybe the third one's a LITTLE underexposed (I still think y'all could stand to be a bit brighter), but the other two look good! Good to know I wasn't seeing things totally differently than everyone else.

I agree about the posing on the third one -- good family shot as it is, but would've been a lot better just by putting your hand on your son's shoulder.

freestylee30 wrote in post #17333700
Re: Third one - I was playing around in PS on this one, specifically with the background to darken it up in an attempt to bring us out a little more. Do you think the exposure overall, even on the family, could stand to be bumped up? Yeah... the hands. I noticed this after the fact but at that point it was obviously too late. I'll try and pay more attention to it. Thanks for the feedback!

Sorry for a late answer, but hadn't noticed your reply. Seems like you fixed it now

Just wanted to say, I always keep my Mac at full brightness minus 6 steps.. Except if I sit in full sun etc. Also, if your in doubt about a picture is to dark, send it to your own email and download it on your phone to see.

I like the third picture a lot.

I agree with the previous post saying it would feel slightly more connected if you were to put your hand on your oldest sons shoulder/arm.

The branch that is sticking out of your youngest son, in the background, is mildly distracting but that's me searching for criticism and nitpicking. Great pic!