Portrait help

I'm getting into photographing headshots, what advice could you give me?

I'm a little bit self-taught in CS3, but I'd like to hear what you experts have to say.

Here's a sample of a head shot I recently did -- my cousin Jason

Can we see the original aswell? It looks a little hot on the face, and perhaps oversharpened

It looks overcontrasted and oversharpened. Don´t use flash directly to the face. You get some ugly shadows you can see on the wall.

You have one big hallo around the model because you abused retouching.


Try to use natural light, learning about it, practising and using Manual mode. Try different appertures, play with DOF and get natural results.

I agree about not using flash that way, try difusing the light in some way (ie put toilet paper or regular paper) if you are using a built in flash, also set the flashes exposure to -2/3 or even -1... ambiental light would be even better... also raising contrast in pp isn't very good to do for portraits nor is sharpening, cos it isn't flattering towards stuff like the acne or whatever that is on the guys forhead...