my wife cancelled on me - so I convinced my daughter to humor me - C&C please

Since my daughter hit about a year to a year and a half of age, I decided to take photography a little more seriously and do more than just point and shoot. In the past 1-1.5 years (my daughter is 2.5) I've come a LONG way but I recognize that I'm NOWHERE near where I want to be. That said, occasionally I manage to create something I enjoy.

My 7.5 month pregnant wife promised to humor me and allow me to take some pictures last night, but then wasn't feeling up to it when the time came. So, I snagged Kyla (our daughter) and took her to the field behind our house and took a few pictures. This is one that I really liked. Shot into the sun with the 6D + 135L @ f/2. This lens is one of my favorites as it's insanely sharp, renders beautifully, and the flare is AWESOME when you want it!

Of course, everyone on FB loved it - but I have literally posted pictures of her sleeping before taken with a cell phone that were just plain ugly and they all love those shots too - lol. There, it's about the subject matter, not about beautiful shots. So, I wanted to post here and get some feedback, if you don't mind. How can I improve with shots like this? I'm including a before/after as well to show the effect of the lens flare on the shot.

I also did a local edit by selecting only my daughter, increasing exposure another 1/3 of a stop, decreasing the temperature a tad, and increasing contrast and clarity. Globally, I very slightly increased the exposure and adjusted the tone curve (VERY minimal tone curve adjustment - as you can see in the screen shot), changed the color temperature and added a slight amount of red tint and that was it. Again, this "look" was created mostly by the lens and shooting into the light.

As for my "model"... she doesn't accept direction nor care what I think - lol. I managed to get her to stand where she was and "smell" the flower and about 8 seconds later after her goofing around and approximately half a second before she was done with my shenanigans, this moment presented itself. Slight crop for composition.

Thanks for any feedback!

I really like the shot and the post processing.

Thanks! I really appreciate that!

I'm up for C&C if anyone is so inclined.

Thanks!

Jonathan

Great capture even though that's all you got. A little too "yellowish" for me as far as PP.

Nice capture, back lighting is awesome!

Very nice! Blow it up & hang it!

I like it. Very nice.

Thanks everyone!

Buckeye1 wrote in post #17478023
Great capture even though that's all you got. A little too "yellowish" for me as far as PP.

In real life, it was fairly yellow. The camera, depending on how you perceive it, either A) did a good job of getting a white balanced temperature or B) really screwed up the white balance by not capturing the actual color of the light. That said, I definitely pushed it past what was actually there. I appreciate the comment. I may play with it and see if backing down the color temperature enhances the picture. Thanks!

The "before" shot is fine.

The "after" shot is awesome!

Way to cute! How do you make the background light up like that?

Very nicely done!

I also think that the post is a little too yellow but definitely gives a nice warmer feeling than the pre.

Maybe a square format and a little vignette? black and white version?

Whole body shot in that light and maybe a bigger prop/flower would look great as well, but I understand with kids, you take what you can get.

Yeah, the more I look at it, the more the intense yellow stands out to me. Funny how distance (via time) will "bring you back" to reality a bit It WAS pretty yellow out there though! I have been trying to convert more images to black and white and can't believe I didn't think to do it with this one. Here's a straight conversion with the same settings...

mamaof2 wrote in post #17483541
Way to cute! How do you make the background light up like that?

The only settings I messed with other than what you can see in the screen grab earlier in the thread was the split toning. I applied a 0 Hue and 8 Saturation to the Highlights and that's it. I did apply local adjustments to my daughter but the only way that affects the background is via the contrasting looks.

Thanks y'all!

Thanks and love this picture in B&W!

first one is great but the BW has a superb feel to it, love it

Beautiful! I am new to LR. Looking at your screen grab of the settings, I can see the added vibrence but I can't tell how the yellow was added. Was it just from raising the temp? I really like the effect and have some recent raws of my kids that were just as cold SOOC as your original. I would love to warm them up the same way.