Some Candid Portraits

Remember ... advice is worth what you pay for it ...

The good
Natural lighting is excellent. Exposure is great.
And here is the key element ... everything is not centered. It looks like you naturally move everything off center by instinct ...very good.

The opinion
Photo 1 is called "Fat" light. Notice how you lose the back eye in shadow and there is no highlight in the eye. Also, this is a younger male, so you can somewhat get by with it but the lighitng will kill you with women over the age of XX (age depends on how they see themselves). Now here is the opinon side of this. I am a strong believer in "short" light for portraits. In the 4 photograhers I trained and released to their own studios, that was one consistant rule. The topic is debatable, but I am right (LOL )

The bad
Move on ...close up documentation of what this person looks like. Nicely done, but there is more story to tell here.

The really good
Gawd I love natural ligting, notice how it models the face ... nothing better (ok that may not be right, but you get the idea - nice flattering light)

In my opinion, #1 has the best pose, the best composition and the best lighting. The lighting in #1 is very good and the head is turned at just the right angle for the light and the camera. The 3-dimensional look is enhanced by the lighting and all the facial structure and contours are brought out very clearly by the shadows.

In my opinion the lighting is a little too flat in #2 and 3.

Very good portraits, congratulations.

I was shooting mostly at f/1.4 - so that I could get high enough shutter speeds. Because of this, I was wary of losing focus in parts of the face and thus focused on the eyes, recomposed, and shot.

I read earlier yesterday on the forum that this is a bad technique, though. What should I do to ensure that the eyes remain sharp in shots like this when depth of field is limited? Is there anything that I can do outside of changing focus points? (I have been shooting with center point only)

Oops...I meant f/1.8, not f/1.4. Wishful thinking, I guess.

Higher "film speed" (not sure how to say that in digi speak)
more light (move subect closer to light source)

As was suggested, you could set a higher ISO and thereby get the equivalent gain of a faster lens. However, I'm not sure what you read that suggested that you were doing anything incorrectly. Maybe I'm missing something, but from what you say, I think you are correct in your focusing - I see nothing wrong with that technique.

Having said that, it is also true that a smaller aperture would give you a greater DOF and less possibility of focusing error.

What Robert said reminded me of a "rule" I once heard for people portraits ... focus on the eyes and use DofF to keep the nose in focus.

For what ever it may be worth ...